The Brushfire Effect and Reputation Management
When I was a kid we used to build fires in a nearby wood. One dry summer some sparks from the fire started a brushfire. We ran around stomping out little blazes as they started but they kept popping up in other places. Eventually a neighbor came by with a shovel and we were able to stop our little conflagration. No damage done but things could have turned out very differently.
In social media this reflects something I’m calling the Brushfire Effect. It’s not the Groundswell, instead it is the fact that a small spark can spread extremely fast, possibly turning into a big problem- or opportunity. This brushfire effect is probably the primary reason for diving into social media if you manage brands or reputations.
It’s relatively easy to monitor what people are saying on the high-traffic sites with existing tools. However it’s out there in the long tail of social media that brushfires start and spread until the big guys take notice. And the time you need to be aware of a nascent brushfire is while its still out there in that long tail because that’s where you can address things early on- before they get out of control. You might even be able to change things with shovel instead of a fleet of planes dropping tons of water.