Why aren't we using social media better than this?

There were a few instances during the past few weeks that had me shaking my head. Now some of you who know me think that I am a completely opposed to social media in any and all formats. That is a total and complete falsehood. I don't fall in love with items because they happen to be new, I become interested in items because I perceive they offer a distinct competitive advantage.

Having said that, I am surprised at the limited or perhaps the miss directed scope we see when it comes to social media. We see people who offer updates on every little element that is going on in their lives with no filter regarding how appropriate or interesting it may be. We see organizations stumbling over each other to be the latest on Twitter or Facebook with no idea regarding why they wish to do so. One thing we do not see, is organizations forming a quick strategy about how to deal with social media for those times when computing will fail them,

Case in point was last week's Facebook outage. While I am sure we would all find it somewhat funny to think of this happening, one of the most sensible things for Facebook to do would be to go on some other outlet, or via e-mail, notify their base that the site was down and would stay down for some time. What they did end up doing is reverting back to the good old days and send out e-mail updates to the news media. While I somewhat chuckle at the idea of Facebook using Twitter to announce they couldn't bring their web site up, it would have been a most most effective way of reaching their target audience and, in my opinion, a means that would not have caused a great deal of long term harm or embarrassment to Facebook.

Social Media is a great tool. The great weakness of social media is that most agencies and communications practitioners are offering poor advice on how to use it. The advice I am hearing is similar to saying, "paint each house purple." When it comes to social media, the need should match the organization and not the other way around. Also some of the great potential for social media is being ignored. Why isn't it being better developed as a crisis communication tool? Given that Crisis Comm is about getting the right message to the right people as soon as possible, the big question we need to answer as corporate communications professionals today is why are we looking at social media as an entertainment tool and not a strategic communications one?