The Social Media MBA: Your Competitive Edge in Social Media Strategy Development and Delivery [Kindle Edition]

Like many folks nowadays, much of my life is spent living out of hotels. My room and my car are my university. So sat in the bar one night, having some food and reading this book. One of my regular dinner companions asked if he could look at the book. The next week he had been to Amazon as well.

Firstly, an MBA does not teach you much about marketing but does equip you to talk in the same secret language to another MBA graduate. This book is practical and does try to science itself up by including a raft of theories and acronyms. Fear not though, the core of it is actually quite good. The case studies are punchy and explain big name businesses' approaches to social media.

There is a lot of good writing on influence, brands and also about the speed of bad news / customer service. If you have been honest in the build of your social media set up and you do a good job, there is a high chance that you will have a number of advocates who would jump to your assistance.

So many businesses are tempted to press the big social media button without actually doing anything social. Go visit a local restaurant website and I bet you might see a Facebook link, a Twitter link maybe even Pinterest or an RSS feed. But the big question is how many of them use it for anything more keeping their web designer / SEO guy sweet? This book is about genuine engagement using the tools that are suitable for your business or brand.

I bought this book hoping it would help me develop a strategy for social media marketing, which really it was never intended to do, although it has helped me develop my own. It's full of great ideas and very inspirational but doesn't really lay down a step-by-step guide. The particularly good part of this book is th case studies section and the parts written by others in the same industry as this is real life experience and very useful to the rest of us. I'd still highly recommend this book to anyone working in the Social Media arena.

At the risk of feeling like a boys club of social media only - Holloman and his fellow authors have done an excellent job of laying the groundwork for discussion of today's issues and opportunities for social media newbies and champions.

Refreshingly, its focus is on Europe & Asia brand culture thus opening up - and shining a light on - the strategists working outside a US-centric social media world.

The mash-up of agency-side and client-side best-practice, combining theory and personal experience chapter-by-chapter, provides inspiration and an over-riding reassurance that social media is a playground of ideas - some that work and some ( for whatever reason) that don't.

Social Business is about 're-organising the org' to develop the social skills, mind sets and processes of employees and departments. Social Business Intelligence is at the heart of this, building the future around data -driven decisions and consumer needs.

Overall, a good and accessible read, that should be on the reading list for every marketing course and for BM's who need to manage the daily balance of risk and reward. I would however like to see more female collaboration though.