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Social media (along with skimpy marketing budgets) are causing a transformation in marketing to a degree that we haven’t seen for a lifetime. But in our rush to embrace the new, we haven’t taken adequate time to honor the painful transition we are experiencing.

Think of me as your grief counselor for good ol’ message-based marketing. It will still be around for some time yet, but it needs to stop that incessant yapping and get a hearing aid so it can start listening once in awhile now.

In my seven years as a social media acolyte, I’ve spoken with many marketers who grew up at the knee of message-based marketing. I’ve seen how difficult the transition can be. For them, and for you, I offer this reflection on the journey so that you can recognize your own place in it and know that you are not alone—that you have friends who love you and who are eager to see you when you get to the other side. (Just don’t become distracted by the bright white light on your way through.)

• Denial. “Another marketing channel on top of my existing workload, with no extra budget or headcount? This can’t be happening—not to me.” The marketer passes through a period in which social media is thought of purely as a B2C thing. Not gonna happen in B2B. Nope. No way.
• Anger. “Hey, marketing speaks, everybody listens. That’s the way it’s always worked. Enough of this conversation crap already!” A painful, unfortunate, and embarrassing time in which marketers have been known to share their rage over their loss of control of the marketing conversation in an uncontrolled way in public gathering places. (Ever wonder why you don’t hear about Mojitos anymore? The American Marketing Association successfully lobbied the FDA to have Mojitos outlawed after research linked them to these unpredictable outbursts. Those “theme” martinis offered during open bar receptions at marketing conferences are also reportedly on the way out—but it’s taking the FDA some time to catalogue all the different varieties.)
• Bargaining. “Look, we’ll redesign the newsletter. We’ll make the events more targeted to the C-level. Just. Don’t. Make. Me. Tweet!” Another phase marketers probably won’t the grand kids to know about, in which marketers cling to an irrational hope that social media can be postponed or avoided altogether by promising the CMO a reform in lifestyle.
• Depression. “6000 tweets a day mentioning our brand and I’m supposed to assign a ‘sentiment’ to them all? What’s the point of going on?” Only slightly less embarrassing than the anger and bargaining stages, marketers in this stage ban the use of the word “Twitter” in lunch conversation and generally shun the annoyingly perky (unpaid) social media intern, muttering, “What’s he got to be so happy about?”
• Acceptance. “Okay, if we’re going to do this, let’s find some SMEs who have something to say and support them.” At this point, marketers accept that they are responsible for making the social media conversation happen inside the company and with customers and take solace in the fact that it’s another channel for developing and delivering thought leadership—the stuff they’ve been slaving at for the last 20 years. During this stage, marketers have been known to spontaneously shout in a self-actualized fashion, “I am a professional communicator! Learn from me!”

How about you? What stage you at?