Comments on: German Market Can Be Tricky. Try Anyway.

By: Monique Elwell

Monique Elwell — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 04:56:09 +0000

Peter,

Thank you very much for your gracious comments. I’m currently at SXSWi in Austin, TX and have just met Nicole Simon in person for the first time. Hopefully, I will meet you soon. My old stomping ground was NYC. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have enjoyed Berlin.

As to your comments on the specialization of agencies, it’s not so much that agencies here in the U.S. are moving toward specialization, it’s just that very few understand social media. I would also argue that 3/4 of those agencies that say they offer SM, don’t really have enough experience to do so. (The agencies doing it badly are actually what I consider to be my real competition as they sour the client for future business.)

Right now most agencies are on hiring freezes due to the economy. So, even if they wanted to offer SM as a service, they won’t. And for those that aren’t on a hiring freeze, they simply can’t find anyone with more than a year’s experience.

Once the economy turns around and SM gains a tract record, this will change and you’ll start to see some acquisitions occur. Until then, there will be many more small nible SM agencies.

If you’re ever in Denver, Colorado, please look me up. I will give you a big Wild West Welcome. :-)

Best,
Monique

By: DrJ

DrJ — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 04:41:13 +0000

Is there a solution at all?

The division between the American/International blogo-socialnetworko-twittero-web-sphere-tube and the German (or Spanish, French, Japanese) one is language. Unless we become a monolinguistic planet this particular border to entering the “inner circle” will remain. Either German bloggers would have to write in English; international bloggers have to read and write in German; or there has to be some fantastic translation software built into every site/RSS aggregator/comment thread which allow you to read any post in your langauge and respond in your own (which they then see in theirs).

By: Peter Bihr

Peter Bihr — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 14:59:47 +0000

DrJ, great point ;) The German scene can be somewhat exclusive at times. Which makes it hard both for German bloggers to be recognized anywhere outside Germany, and for the whole world to get a foot into Germany, or even get an overview over what's being discussed here. (Bad!) So what's the solution? This is something that we'll need to figure out in the long run...

By: DrJ

DrJ — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 10:24:47 +0000

Good post, and I agree with all points – although I’d nitpick and say on point two that within Europe it isn’t just PERCEIVED as a cluster of individual markets but that it simply IS. The false perception is all on the behalf of the external markets.

I blog in Germany (and actually about Germany in some places), but am in no way a German blogger because I write in English. The number of German twitterers who follow me for three days and then unfollow me again… well it encourages me to get my written German up to scratch enough to blog in their language as well. Although I’m still not sure it will earn me enough kudos to learn the secret handshake.

By: Peter Bihr

Peter Bihr — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 08:43:07 +0000

Thanks for your feedback! Susan, so did you find a magic trick for convincing American clients? ;)

By: susan rice-lincoln

susan rice-lincoln — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 03:21:58 +0000

Really like this post. Having worked in Europe for 20 years, I know how important it is to look at each market as a unique entitiy with itw own discrete needs. This hasn’t always been easy for some of my American clients..
Best
Susan

By: David

David — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 17:31:58 +0000

Great read, I second every point.