Illustration by Anne Helmond
As a Gen Xer I am a member of the first generation to grow up plugged into a computer. In the 4th grade I was gaming with my girlfriend on her family computer- granted the game was Oregon Trail and I could scarcely figure out the commands (I’m not even sure if it had a mouse). I had my first computer class in the 5th grade. The lab consisted of two donated Macintosh 128K computers parked in the hallway outside my classroom.
Adapting to life online came easy and made sense. In middle school I took my first typing class and took pride in ranking high as a supersonic speed typer. With high school came the internet and with that my first introduction to social media, the chat room. Chat rooms still exist today but have lost favor to better organized web forums. Back in the day we would chat with other teens about our favorite music or TV. Twenty to thirty people would all type at one time creating a list of multicolored text scrolling so fast you could hardly read it all as everyone tried to talk at once.
In college, I saw the birth of email and had no idea at the time how it would change the way we work, creating industries that thrive on instantaneous results and shrinking our perception of the world. I enjoyed the free music boom back before the industry had to convince people that downloading music from Napster was a crime. After college, social media sites took off, first Friendster, then Myspace and now Facebook, which admittedly I thought would only last a year or so before the next big thing came along. In 2004 I launched my first website, teaching myself HTML and in 2005 I started my first blog. When Twitter launched I, like so many others, went through some growing pains as we figured out exactly what it was and what it was capable of.
Plenty of folks have touted the benefits (and drawbacks) of using social media for business. It’s used for PR, marketing, networking and sharing news. It crosses all industries linking together people and businesses. I saw Twitter at its best just a couple of months ago when I was complaining (in 140 characters or less) about being over-charged for an oil change. Within minutes I had another offer from a business in my neighborhood guaranteeing me a better price. It was an ah-ha moment that motivated me to want to connect with others in MY industry. I was already an active member of LinkedIn with a well established network, but I wanted something more casual and far reaching. I searched for other designers in Healthcare, Architecture, Interiors, and Exhibit Design, first locally and then globally and came up with surprisingly few results. I went beyond Twitter and looked to subscribe to some professional design blogs but found only a handful. I hit up Coroflot too where I have met many amazingly talented young designers but found very few older established professionals represented there. My options for connecting with designers like me were running thin and I began to wonder what it was about social media that turns off designers.
First, I should say that not all design industries share this aversion to social media. I found industrial designers, graphic designers and fashion designers-a-plenty. For some reason there was a definite lack of architects and interior designers represented in social media platforms. Exhibit designers fell somewhere in the middle, being fairly well represented for the relatively small size of the industry.
Not being able to put my finger on any one answer, I decided to pose the question to my fellow designers using a platform I knew well, the web forum. Although I turned to designers who were already plugged-in, I did have a number of professionals speak out against social media, even though they were participating in it by answering my question. Here are a few responses from the question I posed to a group of Interior Designers and a separate group of Exhibit Designers.
The question was the same:
Why aren’t more designers taking advantage of Social Media Platforms?
Here are few of my favorite answers.
From the Exhibits Forum
“In French, you would say ‘Les cordonniers sont les plus mal chaussés.’ which translates loosely to ‘The cobbler’s children go barefoot’. Social media integration is not only important for our clients, but it is crucial for ourselves & our companies. Now.. to find the time to stay on top of it.” –Marketing Execution Specialist
“I agree with each of you concerning the need for designers to participate in the online social media dialog. I am a member of each of the sites you have mentioned but it comes down to taking the time to regularly read and participate when appropriate. It takes commitment that some have a hard time making. It’s also an investment I am learning that takes time to realize a return. –Designer
“Hopefully because they are getting too busy with projects? Speaking from this Architect’s point of view, I participate occasionally when a topic is one I’m interested in but I find some of the networks are filled with product reps or marketing folks, and few actual design discussions, project leads, political issues, or larger social issue discussions that better suit my own interests. Want to talk proactively about climate change (not a denier discussion please) and future long range adaptation planning? – I’m on board! Want to ‘shoot the breeze’ ? – sorry, not much interested!” – Architect
“I think there are SO MANY groups that there is a bit of overload. I also think there is very little really meaningful open discussion – and for good reason. How much of your private business or career affairs are you going to put out for all to see? Industry wide issues – yes, updates on new projects or an article you read- maybe – but real discussions about things that mean something to us? That is for the back of a darkened theater, ballroom, arena or exhibit floor.” –Creative Director
From the Interior Design Forum
“Being a designer and the one responsible for updating our company page I realize that although at first it does not seem so, it can actually be fairly time consuming. From writing status updates, searching for friends, promoting your page, most days it is difficult to fit into a busy schedule. I have been told from professional who are in the IT and Marketing fields that the key to your success is consistency, which means 3+ posts a day. Also, Facebook seems to be more widely used for friend connections and social interaction but does not appear to be as progressive or beneficial for every sector of the business market yet. In time Interior Design may create a place for itself on this media site but it may be better suited to Linked In or design specific areas of the web. Something else to consider, as the generations age and the younger workers who currently use Facebook to stay on top of anything and everything in their lives move up the ladder, do you think this may further increase the participation of all types of businesses in this type of media?” –Lead Designer
“As a hospitality design firm I can say that not one of our current clients are on Facebook. A couple of them are on LinkedIn but their participation is, so far, very limited. Most of these corporate clients are not into the technology even if their corporations are….others further down the chain are covering these areas. Until the actual decision makers are into the technology of social networking, I do not see this as been a strong marketing potential for the hours required to become a felt presence in social networking. Maintaining a close observation to the trends and keeping up to date is important as the hooked-in generation slowly starts to rise to the level of making the corporate decisions…..oh, such interesting times we do live in!” –Partner (Design Firm)
“I attended an all day workshop today on the benefits of using Facebook (FB) for business. With 450 million users and on average spending @ 6hrs a week using this platform that is growing primarily among 45 year olds and older, it is not a market to dismiss. As a new eCommerce business, with an unconventional product, we are finding many customers through interior design related blogs, FB and potentially LinkedIn. In conjunction with traditional marketing, social networking (Web 2.0) has become invaluable for businesses. It’s not going away and it’s all about adapting with the times. Like that Breck commercial (some of us may remember) word travels virally through the Internet across all social media.” –Design Professional
“I think if the economy was much better and we were all busy with clients we would not even be discussing this. The same goes for our clients, if they were busy working and making money so they could afford us, they would have less time for social media. Social media is time consuming, I would love to be busy enough with what I like to do to pay someone else to deal with it.” –Interior Designer
This is just a sampling of some of the more than 30 comments I received. As you can see the feelings, even among those who are plugged-in, are varied. I did notice a common theme; many designers viewed social media as a tool to connect with clients specifically. Few valued it for other types of connections like networking between other design professionals or connecting to vendors. If they felt their clients weren’t utilizing social media platforms they believed it wasn’t worth their time. There was also a large group of designers who commented on how time consuming it is to participate in blogs, Tweeting or other forums or who thought there were too many options available and were overwhelmed with the choices. On the other side of the debate, there were many participants who said that while designers may be slow to adapt to social media platforms today they would have to down the road to remain competitive as the younger tech-generation ages.
This dialogue took place on LinkedIn Group Discussions.
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