Today I received one of the best-ever comments on a blog posting; however, the person who responded to my post took the time to track down my address and then sent me a very thoughtful message via email. Given the trouble he took to communicate in this manner, I surmise that he did not want his reply to appear within the public environment of social media.
What’s interesting is that there is nothing in what he wrote that is truly private. Au contraire. Judging from the content only, it would have been a very helpful comment to have posted on this blog. Others might have benefited from what he was sharing: what he has discovered about software compatibility with Windows 7 for various programs commonly used within professional services firms’ back office. My correspondent’s email is directly relevant to my firm’s situation.
But the person who responded to my post is an attorney in southern California. I can only imagine that, as an attorney, he has chosen to be very cautious about posting his personal opinions in the wide open spaces of the social media world. Perhaps his law firm has policies against this.
In any case I’m grateful that he took the time to send this email message, as he has alleviated some of my concerns about software compatibility.
The Irony of Timing
And on an ironic note: When my commenter’s email arrived, I happened to be skimming Shiv Singh’s Social Media Marketing for Dummies. I had just reached the point in Shiv’s discussion when he steps the reader through the SIM tactics that are most relevant, based on what stage someone has reached within the marketing funnel.
It made me smile, to encounter a real-world example of someone helping me think through a purchase decision at the moment I was reading Shiv Singh’s analysis of this process in the SIM context. I also chuckled because my commenter did not neatly fit into any of the 3 categories that Shiv has defined as social influencers.
Oh well, life is messy. And rules are meant to be broken.
