See on Scoop.it – M-learning, E-Learning, and Technical Communications
Almost three years ago, right after university, I talked to an awesome HR professional about my career prospects. While she gave me a lot of great info that day, one thing that stuck to me was her
Danielle M. Villegas‘s insight:
Like so many other aspects of technical communications, I think what will need to happen–and I think the author of this article is basically saying this–is that we can’t be separating the role of "social media manager" and "marketer" for much longer. We can’t keep those roles in silos. This is the kind of things where these two professions will end up merging more and more often in companies, I tend to think. So it’s one thing for the social media managers to have to learn more about marketing strategy (yes, I hear a lot more buzz about content marketers these days), but similarly marketers need to learn to better embrace and manage how to use social media outlets. So, I don’t get the impression that the social media manager is (almost) dead, but rather it’s evolving instead.
It seems that tech comm, in general, is in so much flux these days–it’s hard to keep up! But the more skills and flexibility you can bring to the table, the more marketable you will be.
–techcommgeekmom
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About TechCommGeekMom
Danielle M. Villegas is a technical communicator who currently consults for Cox Automotive, Inc., and freelances as her own technical communications consultancy, Dair Communications. She has worked at the International Refugee Committee, MetLife, Novo Nordisk, BASF North America, Merck, and Deloitte, with a background in content strategy, web content management, social media, project management, e-learning, and client services. Danielle is best known in the technical communications world for her blog, TechCommGeekMom.com, which has continued to flourish since it was launched during her graduate studies at NJIT in 2012. She has presented webinars and seminars for Adobe, the Society for Technical Communication (STC), the IEEE ProComm, TCUK (ISTC) and at Drexel University’s eLearning Conference. She has written articles for the STC Intercom, STC Notebook, the Content Rules blog, and The Content Wrangler as well. She is very active in the STC, as a former chapter president for the STC-Philadelphia Metro Chapter, and is currently serving on three STC Board committees. You can learn more about Danielle on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/daniellemvillegas, on Twitter @techcommgeekmom, or through her blog.
I agree with you. In the not-too-distant future both the technical communicator and the marketer will need to be social-media aware. It’ll be expected of us — as much a part of our jobs as using authoring software.
Kelvin has it right: The social media manager will not die quickly — IF that person “acquires new (but related) marketing skills.” Or if they acquire new (but related) tech comm skills. It won’t be enough to be just a “social media manager” any more — and it won’t be enough to be a marketer or a technical communicator without being social-media aware. Welcome to the future.
I think something that just surprises me a bit–at least with certain professions–is how many people are still not involved in social media. Now, my husband doesn’t have any social media accounts (OK, he does have a Twitter feed he doesn’t use, and a LinkedIn account he also doesn’t use), but he’s a developer. He’s really not interested in communications. Marketers, however, ARE communicators, so you’d think that they’d really be on top of it. Alas, I’m starting to learn that I’m more fanatical about trying to stay on top of trends than the average user (and so are you, Larry, and anyone else who’s on social media). More power to us!