Regular readers of our blog have probably noticed a theme; we take current real world events and issues and and apply marketing theory/analysis to them. We try to keep it fun and eschew topics of politics and death, but a recent loss has brought up a very interesting question:
Why are more that 100 NEW people PER HOUR on Twitter “following†the recently deceased DJ AM?
Twitter’s slogan is “see what people are doing right now.â€Â So what are these thousands of new people who are now following the late DJ AM looking for “right now?”
Understanding consumer psychology is the first step for us marketing professionals when crafting an outreach strategy. The second step for us is to leverage the media (public relations) and modern technologies (twitter, facebook, etc) to reach our desired audience. Now however, there appears to be a shift in the paradigm; it seems that these modern technologies have superseded consumer psychology, and it’s the technology itself that we need to fully wrap our arms around.
More importantly, can Twitter be used as a medium for identifying people in trouble?
Did any single one of the more than 115 THOUSAND “followers†of DJ AM see his last living tweet as a cry for help?
Based on his last tweet (featured above) in relation to his previous tweets; it seemed like a plea to me.
As children, we all had “imaginary friends” that we’d talk to – now we have what can be considered the equivalent – we have twitter accounts with “followers” that we tweet to. Â I feel that people are using these new mediums as a way to communicate otherwise hard topics to their “followers” just as we did to our imaginary friends when we were adolescents. It’s as if modern technology has made traditional communication so informal that people are sending out smoke signals of distress via tweets. Maybe I’m over-thinking it, but I will go on record and guarantee this is not the last time we will hear about somebody using convenient technology to express something that is far from convenient.
I’m not a psychologist, I’m a publicist who toes the line of a self proclaimed journalist, so I’m not going to dig up theories to back this logic (to be honest, I don’t think they exist, yet).  I do however look forward to the journalist and their respective publication that that veers away from the traditional Wall Street Journal article on how to increase your bottom line by using Twitter, and instead explores the notion of people using Social Media as cry for help, and on those people that continue to “follow” them when it’s unfortunately too late.
Adam Goldstein (DJ AM) was a very good friend of some of my best friends; our deepest love and respect goes out to him and his family.
August 30th, 2009 at 6:55 pm
While I feel very sad this has happened to an individual that is close to your friends, and sadly the poor guy cheated death only to not be fortunate enough to have an additional near miss, the truth is that he was a druggie and when things like this happen – it makes me wonder where these so-called friends were way before it ever got to this point. Twitter is a communication tool, yes – but its always several layers removed from whoever is following you on it. It is up to those who are closest to you to help you when you are down, and if youre doing things that are life threatening – call you on it and get you the help you need. At this point, I feel as if yet again those who are professing their love to this guy are just attention starved individuals that in reality liked to be seen with the guy and that’s about it. Bless his soul and his family, but he was being used as that–which yes is probably why he wrote something like that as his last ‘tweet’ per se. But that’s the name of the game in showbiz, and another notch to its better to get what you need that to always get what you want. RIP Adam..hope you are in a better place now.