Social Media Programs: Cultivate-Don't Control.

The role of social media is at its height and our generation is supporting it as a form of communication in PR. This article offers advice for the PR practitioner who uses social media networks for organizing its efforts rather than forcing control over them. Some believe the development and use of these programs is the gateway to taking over social networks. The author steps over this belief and stresses the importance of the "four pillars of social media success": planning, recruiting, training and promotion. Using social media programs is not one of the four, but it can be used as a mean of communication in each.

Personally, I have explored more new media in the past month than ever before. It is prime time for exploring blogging, micro-blogging, twittering, podcasting, and every other form of social networking that doesn't involve verbal communication. I support the idea of using these programs as a vessel rather than trying to gain control. We are the ones who are going to take new media a step further in the field of PR, and the majority of us are the only ones who have time to focus on the media applications. Rather than seeing it as childish or irrelevent, try to understand how important social networking is in the world of technology and communication.