Tom H. C. Anderson - Next Gen Market Research™

14 Most Tired Social Media Buzz Words
(10 Top Social Media Influencers Part VI)

I asked our uber influential social media friends what buzzwords they’re most tired of hearing. Below is an alphabetical list of their top most annoying social media related buzz words along with accompanying definition (via urban dictionary). “Synergy” received the most votes from our influencers.

• Buzz - 1: Anything that creates excitement or stimulus.

Buzz. It’s what bees do
- Scott Monty

• Drill down - 1: Frequently used to imply that a “reporter” will get to the bottom of the story and then back to the viewers in order to feed their news frenzy. 2: Term used by computer systems people to describe the act of clicking with a computer mouse down through several levels of folders or drop-down menus to reach a specific file, application or folder.

• Epic Fail - 1: Massively bad. 2: Similar to fail, but at an even larger, more pitiful scale. 3: Complete and total failure when success should have been reasonably easy to attain. 4: The highest form of fail known to man

Epic fail. Blah blah freaking blah. Every little thing that goes wrong is not an epic fail. The overuse of the words epic fail is totally an epic fail! Ah the irony.
- Eve Mayer Orsburn

• Guru - 1: A personal religious teacher and spiritual guide in Hinduism. 2: A teacher and especially intellectual guide in matters of fundamental concern. 3: One who is an acknowledged leader or chief proponent

Guru - everyone says they’re one, or an expert, when it seems that almost no one truly is. I consider myself a student still!
- Eric T. Tung

• Influencer - 1: The power to change, encourage, or make a difference without force.

“Influencer” — and I’m not being coy. I’m thrilled to be on Fortune’s list. Looking at the others who are there, I’m extremely honored to find myself in their company. There are certainly “influencers” and it’s important to understand why they are “influential” and who they are in your areas of interest. I am worried, however, that in the social space we are beginning to abdicate our judgment of influence to algorithms or tools that can be gamed. Tools can help us sift some of the wheat from the chaff, but they shouldn’t become the final arbiters of influence, just as any list shouldn’t replace our own discernment on the topic.
- Glen Gilmore

• LBS - 1: Location-Based Service 2: an information or entertainment service, which is accessible with mobile devices through the mobile network and which uses information on the geographical position

[LBS makes the top of Paul Barron's list. I have to agree, especially when talking about social media and text analytics data, location is just another data point, not that special...]

• Monetize - 1: To turn a business such as Twitter into a way of raising revenue. Take something that is already good and make it less useful or fill it with obnoxious ads in order to make money from it.

• Revolutionary - 1: A person who advocates immediate, drastic change, often using violence. 2: Tending to or promoting revolution. 3: Constituting or bringing about a major or fundamental change.

Oh lord… where to begin? So much Frankenspeak, so little time: Impactful. Strategize. Monetize. Win-win. Run it up the flagpole. Synergize. Drill down. And the worst: Revolutionary. (Usually, it’s not.)
- Ann Handley

• Rockstar and Social Media Rockstar - 1: Someone who can stay up and party all night long and wake up and take care of business in the morning. 2: An overused term that used to apply to members of ROCK BANDS. 3: A person who always delivers the goods. 4: Derrogatory term used for persons or groups who feel their social status is greater than it actually is.

…I wish the ‘rock stars’ of social media realized they weren’t
- Jason Falls

• Run it up the flagpole - 1: “Let’s run it up the flagpole and see if anyone salutes it.” In other words, “let’s try [an idea] and see how people react.” 2: Another variant is “Let’s put it in a saucer and see if the cat licks it up.” 3: Associated with glib advertising speak of the early 1960s.

• Shameless self-promotion - 1: Shameless self-promoters focus on mentioning the business continuously, as a name dropper might mention famous people…

Shameless self-promotion — if it’s shameless don’t do it. You’re just asking me to support your shameless behavior. That makes me shameless too.
- Liz Strauss

• Strategize - 1: Verb of Strategy 2:The action of coming up with a strategy. 3: Thinking strategically about a situation or business challenge. 4: A contemporary non-word that has gained acceptance as appropriate business terminology.

• Synergy - 1: Marketing buzzword only rumored to imply the combining of forces for greater productivity and mutual understanding. 2: The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. 3: Also known as “the addition rule”. 4: Synonym for team work.

Synergy. It’s a made up word in the first place. People who use it should be smacked. People who used it twice in one day should be imprisoned.
- Jason Falls

• Win-win - 1: A win-win situation is where all outcomes are desirable. E.g. If you kill him, you’ll get respect and the cops won’t touch you. 2: A term a smarmy salesman or manager uses to tell you that both parties have positive outcomes from a situation. This is rarely true.

A couple of years ago we did a study among senior marketing executives (MENG) on this topic. At the time, the buzz word they were most tired of hearing was “Web 2.0″. I guess they were right as the term now seems to be almost non existent. Curious, what buzz word do you think is next slated for extinction?

@TomHCAnderson
@OdinText