CEO Blog
November 18, 2011
Thoughts on "Josh Brown Gets it Wrong"
www.linkedfa.com/share/80131 - An article written by linkedFA member Brent Carnduff, offers a commentary an article written by Josh Brown recently titled "Raymond James Gets Social Media Right". I can sympathize with Brent's position and how Josh's rant can be taken to heart although I wanted to take a deeper look into Josh's message. What I think we all need to understand is that Josh is a financial advisor with a voice, and voicing one's opinions (especially about an emerging industry) is essentially embracing the concept and heart of social media.
Josh represents the frustration of all FA's in dealing with social media. Collectively as leaders of social media for the financial industry, we can all be doing a much better job in communicating with the end users (FA’s) to understand how they want to leverage social media and the challenges they are encountering. For example, at linkedFA we have a panel of 25 FA’s who provide continual feedback and it still is not enough…. it’s never enough. Additionally, while Josh’s satirical statement can be easily interpreted as offensive (I can often be found wearing jeans and a blazer!) I am actually of the same mind to a certain degree. As is common in any emerging field, there are many individuals out there posturing themselves as social media experts for the financial industry simply to take advantage of those who need real solutions. This poses a challenge for FA’s who do not have the time filter through the crap. On the other side of the coin I know and respect every person Brent mentioned in his blog. As a matter of fact, I go to two of them on a regular basis for advice and guidance, Victor is even on our previously mentioned advisory panel. While all of the individuals mentioned are social media experts I am not sure there is such a thing as a "social media expert for financial advisors" given the current brevity of the industry. This field is different. To be a social media expert for the financial industry you need to not only have a solid grasp on social media itself, but industry regulations, firm regulations (every firm is different) and how the end user wants to leverage social media, and every FA’s practice is different. So rather than getting upset with Josh’s words, let’s hear them for what they are: “is there anyone out there who can give me answers?" Josh, as an FA with a voice in the social media space, you would be an ideal candidate for our Advisory Panel. Should you wish to join and help create the answers, shoot me an email and let's connect.
But I do think we should all agree if there is only going to be one social media expert for the financial industry it should be me!
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