About four years ago I began a friendship with Jason Falls. I started following him on Twitter and read his blog a bit, which always made me laugh and learn at the same time. Then we met at a conference and since we’ve gotten our kids together for ballgames, had wild times at South By Southwest, and even developed a video series for Forbes that we called “Two On Two.”
Our bond was built first on a shared belief system about digital marketing and public relations – a relationship built on professional respect – and evolved into a close personal friendship.
What I admire most about Jason, beyond his belly and dense facial hair, is his independence. He’s blunt with just about anyone, and having spent time in certain companies where people make a career of cowering to authority, it’s a rather refreshing trait.
He’s not a bully by any stretch. I’ve seen plenty of bullying, unfortunately – my last boss once told me, “Let me tell you why you couldn’t be more wrong,” when he simply didn’t understand what I was talking about. So I know the difference. Jason’s just straight-forward and ballsy, which is why his book was titled, “No Bullshit Social Media.”
And thus I was somewhat surprised when a few months ago he decided to leave the consulting business – where he could pretty much do what he wanted, when he wanted – and go corporate-side, joining CafePress as the company’s social media director.
“It’s a different world,” he told me. “It’s been an interesting transition.”
You see, there are a lot of perceived experts out there, some of whom are often parodied in social media circles. Maybe they have a truckload of Twitter followers, like to fire off pithy 140-character critiques of various brands online, and speak to their own intellectual authority. But in fact, many of them have very little practical experience in helping brands actually market themselves or assisting companies in managing reputation in the digital plane.
Jason, however, does have practical experience, and so CafePress CEO Bob Marino came to him seeing social media and enhanced digital marketing as a way to improve the company’s position in the online retail space across it's entire platform that includes the flagship CafePress.com, as well as CanvasOnDemand, GreatBigCanvas, InvitationBox, LogoSportsWear, EZ Prints and ImageKind.
“Lots of online retailers use social media tools, but I don't know that lots of online retailers have made that leap into being truly social companies,” said Falls. “It's not just about using the tools but understanding the balance between engaging withe stakeholders and actually selling things.”
Yes, retail brands are great a spitting out a promotional deal through their Facebook page and telling you over and over how great their products are. But beyond that, online retail, for the most part, has not evolved with the culture of social media – failing to focus on the needs and interests of those consumers who are engaged with the brand within a social media channel.
“CafePress has done a good job in the past of leveraging social in creative ways, but we are not inherently a social business,” added Falls. “My challenge is to rethink the experience for both our shoppers and our designers. If we can empower an audience to create and turn and tell their networks, that will be the first domino to drive people to CafePress. If we can also empower shoppers to share their experience when they come, the we make our social outpost more than just coupons.”
Marino, as well as CafePress.com chief Sumant Sridharan, have given Falls plenty of latitude. The end-game now lies in driving revenues through the social channels and creating a sense of community within CafePress’ core audience.
He unquestionably has his new corporate-side work cut out for him, but if I know Falls – and I do – he’s up for it. Otherwise he would have told me so.
