YouTube boasts 60,000 plus uploads per day with over 100 million videos already online and ready for viewing and that’s just YouTube. Start adding all the other video sharing sites like iFilm, Blip.TV, MySpaceTV etc. There seems to be no end in site for this online video explosion, but it’s not all fun and games. These videos are not all skateboarding dogs and know it all ninjas.

A new and possibly damaging trend is emerging. People are using video and other social media (blogs, forums, podcasts etc.) to forcibly get what they want. People are using social media to get satisfaction and others to get notoriety.

Armies of connected customers are using social media sites to spread buyer beware messages to the masses. Anyone who has ever been wronged by anyone or has had a less than favorable experience with just about anything has found their global sounding board. Legions of the wronged are now armed with video enabled devices and it’s given them the courage to do what they could not do in the past – be heard.

It may not have started with a video of the now infamous Vincent Ferrari who posted his efforts to try and cancel his AOL account but this sure was a rallying cry to the masses. Now everyone is a video vigilante that shoots (video) first and asks questions later all hoping to get their moment in the spotlight with Matt Lauer.

Social media has given the average consumer a way to fight back a way to take charge and throw open their windows to scream, “We’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore!” We can never be screwed again by angry waiters, inferior products or bait and switch marketing by less than ethical businesses. They could prey on us in the past but they better think twice before doing it now! This is great, right?!? Right?

Some are saying that social media has leveled the playing field and created accountability in the business world but that may not be the case at all. The playing field may actually be tipping in the direction of the consumer at the eventual cost of, well, the consumer. Businesses are now fighting a painstaking battle to manage their reputations and guess who will pay for that in the long run?

Connected customers apparently would rather have a bad experience to share on video than actually resolve the issue in question. Issues that seemingly can be easily resolved by simply asking to speak to a manager or owner are now escalated to extreme levels in an instant. To make matters worse, in some cases you only get one side of the story and the accused is not given the opportunity for rebuttal.

When you post a video on YouTube you have the option of allowing comments or not allowing comments as well as having comments instantly appear or await moderation. This is also the case in Blog’s and other community type websites. A growing trend of swaying comments in favor of the customer has businesses concerned and rightly so.

An example of this is a video on YouTube of a woman returning a vehicle to a car dealer. She was not the actual buyer nor was she present during the sale, her mother purchased the vehicle a few days earlier. The story she tells is that her mother was lied to, told one thing and sold something different (that old story) or something to that effect. The video contained snarling comments about thievery, scams and bad business practices at this local car dealer. I watched the video and noticed that the woman never gave anyone a chance to say anything. She never asked for the manager, owner or anyone in authority. She made no attempt to get the whole story. It seemed very one sided so I decided to post a comment which read, “why didn’t you try to resolve this issue with the owner? You were not there when the car was sold so maybe there was a miscommunication?” My comment never appeared and when I tried to re-post, it seemed that I had been blocked from posting altogether. Seems like a clear cut case of “If I want your opinion – I’ll approve it”.

To make matters worse, within an hour of the video being uploaded more negative comments we’re posted by other users. I thought, wow, was this woman right? Maybe this car dealer really is a thief? Upon further examination, all the people that commented in this woman’s favor had just joined YouTube within the last hour. Hmmm, all these people that happened to buy a car at this dealer all joined at the exact same time as this video was uploaded and all commented on the this particular video and never commented on any of the other 100 million videos on the site. This is a perfect example of someone engineering an opinion. There would be no way anyone from the dealership in question could defend their name.

Now that the public has a little power, some are abusing it by using it as a form of intimidation. People are storming in the doors of businesses around the country with cameras in hand demanding to get things done their way or else. Any attempt on the business owner’s part or store clerk to try and deal with the issue off camera and the customer makes a beeline to the nearest WiFi hotspot to upload the video and seething comments of their dissatisfaction coupled with the standard “Buyer Beware”. Seemingly businesses are being bullied and even held hostage with little or no recourse. 

Don’t get me wrong, I think the tools we have available to use are great and can be very powerful and helpful when used properly. Having a voice that can be heard by so many may actually help improve the sad state of customer service in this country. What I’m not a fan of is people using these tools just to gain notoriety or engineering a one sided point of view without concern of who it affects. In the long run it will affect us all.

We live in a clickable culture where one single voice, one single post or one single video can make a difference but this does not mean we can abuse the power we’ve been given. The ability to be heard must be respected before everyone stops listening.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 23rd, 2007 at 8:22 pm and is filed under Social Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.