Weaving the Web of Social Media

I believe there is a correlation between social media and the child’s book Charlotte’s Web. Remember back when you were a kid and your kindergarten teacher read to you the award-winning novel Charlotte’s Web? It was a classic tale about a pig named Wilbur and his new found friendship with a spider named Charlotte. When Wilbur’s life was endangered, Charlotte, the great pal she was, used her web to persuade the farmer to let Wilbur live. How does this relate to social media you ask? Cleverly enough, Wilbur’s threatened life is equivalent to that of a corporation who resists the online fad we call social networking and blogging. However, with a little persuasion from Charlotte’s “Web” (no pun intended) the corporation’s way of life can be preserved. More so, as many folks are taking a liking to social networks (Myspace, Facebook and Twitter) social media can be a huge advantage to those corporations daring enough to take the leap.

Oh What a Web We’ve Weave
Now that story time is over, let’s get down to business. The question that I am posing today is whether or not GE has used social media effectively. After doing my own research, I decided that GE is making strides in the right direction. They have slowly moved away from the old-fashioned means of communication, like press releases and investor briefings, and started a company blog called GEReports.com to share their news with investors. However, the pessimistic side of me picked away at the website’s structure. At first glance it looked cluttered, especially the sidebar. It also had all this techno-jargon which was hard for a dimwit like me to understand. As an investor of GE, I immediately searched for a stock quote, but it was NO where to be found. I questioned: Was GE trying to hide the fact its stock value has dropped 80% since the year 2000? Or that they are trading under 20 dollars a share for the first time in decades? Next I selected the viewpoint labeled “Energy and Climate” and read aimlessly about how environmental and economic challenges in third world countries presented an exciting opportunity for GE to “do what they do best” and create an innovative way to bring clean water to families in Africa. Where was the talk of the water and air pollution GE has already created here, in the United States? As sensitive to the subject as I am, I clicked the viewpoint labeled “Hudson River Cleanup” and was happy to see that GE at least acknowledged this situation, as it affects my home town. However, there were no blog updates or progress reports regarding this issue. Good or bad, a blogs a blog, and GE has put forth the effort.

GE Hit the Multimedia Goldmine
GEReports.com was not all bad. I was thoroughly impressed at all the great links they had at the bottom of the site. YouTube, which is increasingly growing amongst young adults and senior citizens, also a core group within GE’s demographics, provides amazing behind the scenes footage of GE commercials, industrial equipment and healthymagination campaigns. I was extremly happy to see that GE chose Flickr. It is a wonderful, photo friendly website and social media. I think it’s the best way to share photos on the web and within the Flickr community. I will definitely be tapping back into that link to use pictures for later blogs. However, I couldn’t help but wonder where the link to Hulu was, seeing as how GE is now partners with the website. Hulu has a channel dedicated to News and Information, which GE should take advantage of, even if it’s only a place for advertisement.

Into the Twittersphere
I checked out GE’s twitter page, created by Megan Parker, and again was blown away by all the jargon. I immediately wondered what she got her degree in (thought for a second about switching my major to engineering) and then questioned whether or not she even understood the stuff she was tweeting. According to eMarketer.com, a research and analysis of digital marketing websites, 66% of people on Twitter are under the age of 25, while 15% of tweeters are between the ages of 25-29. My advice to Megan, and GE, is to make your tweets more generation friendly. People in their twenties, excluding the geeky engineers, do not want to hear about a flash explosion blocker or industrial loan companies… Tell me about my stocks, healthcare and how GE is cleaning our environment. And for Pete’s sake please speak in English!
GE _Reports
Full Article by eMarketer

Get Hip or Get Out
Social media is the “cool” way of communicating with the now generation. According to the NY Times, the use of social media by people from ages 35 to 54 grew 60% in the last year. “Adults are just catching up to what teens have been doing for years,” stated Jeremiah Owyard, industry analyst. If GE wants to be successful it better “stay hip” to the social media.

Catch ya on the flip-side, GEewhiz!

Welcome to My New Innovation!

“Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration.” Thomas Edison

General Electric was named 6th on Fortune 500’s annual ranking of America’s largest Corporations but it is number 1 on my priority list! I chose GE as the topic for my Corporate Relations class assignment because of its renowned ingenuity, questionable undertakings (considering my home town is located on the Hudson River), and the simple fact that my GE stockholder portfolio has plummeted. I guess you can say I am already well invested in this conglomerate!

About the company
General Electric leads the technological industry as it develops products such as jet engines, gas turbines and even medical imagining equipment. According to Wikipedia, Forbes ranked GE as the world’s largest company, with 323,000 employees worldwide in 2009. GE has even broken the media barrier with an 80 percent stake in NBC Universal, making it a driving force in television and film. Additionally, NBC Universal’s recent partnership with the News Corporation to form Hulu.com, a video-streaming website, GE has now immersed into the world of online entertainment. As a Communications student, in future blogs I will be taking a further look into GE’s successes and or failures within the social media network.

GE: Friend or Foe
GE has much to boast about when it comes to lending a helping hand, or a couple million dollars. From providing company bailouts to its bountiful contributions to the United States health care market, GE looks philanthropic on the outside. One should give kudos to GE’s public relations people for doing such a spectacular job in this category. However, some of what GE’s publicists and image consultants aren’t saying is that from 1947 to 1977 GE dumped an estimated 1.3 million pounds of PCBs into the Hudson. Or that on April 11th, 2008 GE’s stock (NYSE-GE) plunged 13% to $32.05, devastating investors like myself. Not to mention, it erased about $47 billion in market value and put a big cut in the company’s annual earnings forecast. This stock decline was recorded as the worst for GE since the stock market crash of 1987.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Throughout this semester I will be taking a look at how GE communicates their reputation, emphasizing the positive and minimizing the negative (if they even address the negative at all) through different media outlets. I also want to uncover the challenges and opportunities that exist for the PR people at GE for improving the company’s reputation. And lastly, as a future public relations practitioner, I will take a look at GE’s job market, including new promotions and daily earnings.

Watch this!!

My intentions for this blog are to be witty and creative. It is not meant to offend the geeky, analytical type (aka GE’s target audience), but my plan is to look at the company through a somewhat critical lens, while playing the Devil’s Advocate. Sincerely yours, GEewhiz!