Social Media

For a long time I was a Facebook member, but never logged on. I’d kind of lumped it in with all the other online teenage ennui-swapping sites like Twitter and Bebo. But about a year ago I kept hearing that it was ‘good for business’ to have a presence in Social Media, so I set up this blog, and started posting links on Twitter and Facebook. I’ve always had page one Google hits for my wine tours, but now I do seem to be getting a higher Google ranking and also scoring OK on MSN and Yahoo – so I guess it’s working.

To me, the downside of Facebook is that Famous people also use it as an advertising/PR medium – so musicians, comedians, politicians and so forth play it as a billboard for their latest policies, gig, CD releases etc., without any attempt to interact with their ‘friends’. So you might think that you’re Kiri Te Kawana’s Facebook best buddy, but she’ll just be running adverts for her career and certainly won’t bother replying to any conversation thread that you have added.

To my surprise, I have found a lot of former colleagues from many fields on Facebook, and have established contact with long lost pals from rock music, comedy, wine and writing. So I’ve become a bit of a born again fan and obsessively check the site during the day. Yet – the sort of friends who took a weeks to write back in the old days of snail mail are actually no faster online than they were then. Procrastinating bastards don’t change – even if a message reply can happen in a keystroke.


Phil runs wine tours around Auckland.  OK?  You gotta problem with that?
http://www.finewinetours.co.nz/