This notion has been percolating and is based on a feeling, not rigorous research - I’d love to hear what you think…

I read this comment by Scot Duke | January 7, 2008 1:40 PM, on a post by Marshall Kirkpatrick on ReadWriteWeb, one of my favorite blogs, entitled “Ten Common Objections to Social Media Adoption and How You Can Respond” :

…I still would find it hard to believe that any business would totally ignore any opportunity to market to a new audience. It comes down to offering a safe quality environment for social media…

I started thinking: what does a safe, quality environment for companies look like, when it comes to social/new media? Is it easier for companies to feel that they control the message that’s going out in a video, or videocast, or podcast, so that there’s at least the ‘gloss’ of a guideline for what’s coming back in?

Perhaps these tools can help individuals and companies to reach out to an audience as a kind of bridge between:
pure social media(e.g., social media sites like Mixi and Facebook).
and
traditional media (newspapers, TV, magazines, radio) the comfortable and expensive outreach to a mass audience that may or may not care about the message…

In other, still musing, words: control of the quality of the message (because a blog, video, or podcast is being offered to the audience) feels more possible than in a social media channel, where it feels a bit less possible to control at least the offering, if not the response.

This is clearly not a clearly formed thought

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
oh, I’m posting this Technorati Profile for a bit of tinkering under the hood.

FEW, otherwise known as Foreign Executive Women in Japan has remarkable meetings every month. One of the main reasons I have enjoyed them so much over the years is the audience: FEW members and friends are a diverse group of smart, experienced women, who always bring so much to the conversation. And the speakers I’ve seen have been uniformly thought-provoking.

(I’m not just saying that because I’ll be speaking at FEW this Thursday at 7:00pm at the FCCJ ; more information here . ahem… )

Modern Media Japan is gearing up to be FEW’s Media Sponsor and in May, I’m joining the Board as their Sponsorship Director - so this Thursday’s talk is a kind of launch event. I’ll be presenting our New Media Toolkit, which is an approach to creating your company’s/your own New Media strategy, the genesis of which came from my best friend, Lauren, and was reinforced by my experience at the Tokyo Small Business Meetup

If you’re a member or an aspiring member or a guest of a member of FEW, I do hope to see you there!

photo credit: Petra (FEW)