My colleague Carol Orsborn wrote a great blog post yesterday about the role social media sites play in delivering the real, personal support that is often lacking in what many people still think of as the “real world.”
I know that Carol’s experience – she says she found more support for personal setbacks online than she did from friends and colleagues of many years – is real, because of what I see at VibrantNation.com.
In thread after thread, we see how smart women over 50 find support in the most sensitive areas of their lives, such as:
- Supporting a daughter who has come out of the closet
- Managing their own ambivalence about unfulfilling marriages
- Yearning for spiritual answers that traditional churches don’t provide.
I can’t think of a better way to remind us why social media have very quickly become the place where anyone can find the connections and advice they need – about anything. And if they find support about the most sensitive and personal aspects of life online, we know that they are willing to find answers about products and services there, too.
We do see some marketers starting to appreciate this fact. But we see many more who resist, perhaps because they can’t control the tone of each conversation. Women, after all, will swing in one brief conversation between talking about their job loss to their favorite pair of jeans.
As Carol’s blog post makes clear, that is an opportunity, not a risk, and any company that remains reluctant to join consumers at the most important moments (and conversations) in their lives is missing the boat.
thank you so much Lisa, that helps a lot. I know he tried to blame me for so much stuff, but like I told all of his family and mine none of that added up to a divorce. I do realize it's his needs, it just hurts so bad to think how many years he's
How funny....i only very recently (within last week) read the coconut oil articles on the web. (100 uses, 80 uses etc.) so i bouht some and ordered some from amazon. (Im a stockpiler.)
Have started trying some of the uses. I tried using it a
Most marketers, most television networks, most consumer driven advertisers and pr firms hire the young and the clueless about US. They don’t get it because they can’t. They have not lived long enough or experienced the defining moments that make up our cadre of 50+ powerhouses. We need to be part of the defining process, the tastemakers, the movers and the shakers who can speak directly about what appeals to US!