By its very nature, the social media landscape is amazingly quick to change. Remember MySpace and Friendster? Online media users forsook them for Facebook and Twitter like college students "forgetting" to return the calls of high-school pals. To be able to harness the power of all this constantly morphing connection and collaboration, it takes forward-thinking entrepreneurs who are able to stay ahead of a trend curve that's growing sharper and faster every day.

Garrio Harrison is ready. Armed with little more than a business plan and a deep enthusiasm for online socialization, he recently started Doublethink, aka Dblthk, a St. Paul-based media consultancy that looks to hop ahead of its more traditionally oriented competitors by focusing exclusively on social media instead of merely including a Facebook-and-Twitter-and-Ning strategy as part of a larger media plan.

The Personal is Critical

Traditional firms try to wedge social marketing efforts into an array of services, as if the social media were just another tool for getting a firm's message out there, but Harrison believes that the way that social media work is far different from what's come before. Instead of simply broadcasting a message--the way that ads and promotional materials do--social marketing should tap into the nature of sites like Facebook, which are far more about sharing opinions, ideas, and experiences than about providing information.

The difference between old and new media actually goes even deeper, Harrison believes. Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and emails are sprinkled not only with ideas and opinions, but also with personal information and photos. The lines between personal and professional are not just blurring, but getting erased, and Harrison thinks that's a wonderful thing.

"When you can understand someone's mindset, you feel that you know them better," he says. "Social media marketing isn't about selling things, but about creating connections among people."

Finding the Business Momentum

Harrison talks about his vision as he walks through the three-floor expanse of CoCo, a St. Paul collaborative work and networking space that houses Doublethink office life. In his own groovy area, he doesn't have a bank of computers or student interns dashing to and fro; instead, a lone laptop sits at a corner, and Harrison has filled the wall with elaborate diagrams of marketing plays, drawn like a coach's instructions to his players.

Arrayed on the coffee table are books about the intersection of tech and culture, and it's just as easy to picture Harrison sprawled on the huge, comfy brown couch learning about Apple's early days as to see him tapping away at the computer. In both cases, he believes, it's all about soaking up insights and ideas that can be used later while chatting online or "live" in the work space.

This is another significant aspect of the social-media model: Connection flows not just in the virtual world, but also in the physical one, breaking down the distinctions between "online friends" and "real friends" just as it erases the once hard-and-fast boundary between the personal and the professional.

"At the risk of sounding cheesy, I'm 'doublethinking' how social media is used," Harrison says. "That's why I call this a human-centric design firm. It's looking at the way in which humans are acting right now, and finding ways to put companies and products into those conversations."

Realtors as Real Friends

A prime example of how Doublethink can slip into this arena is with an initial project that Harrison is crafting, involving a social-media service for realtors. Instead of the simple, static sites that realtors use now to promote houses and moving-related information, Harrison's service turns a realtor into a connector.

"This isn't just someone's ad on a bus bench," he says. "This is about a realtor as a central source for clients, beyond the buying and selling process. With social networks, they can do analytics and track site responses, but they can also hold open housewarming parties that invite all of a new homeowner's Facebook friends."

A realtor becomes a source for moving help, furniture buying, home repair, and numerous other services, aided by social media. Basically, she's the helpful neighbor just beyond the digital back fence, the one who always knows a great handyman and clues you in about major furniture sales. In return, you send all home-buying and home-selling friends her way.

This is the shift in our culture that social media are bringing about, Harrison believes: people no longer choose accountants, lawyers, realtors, or other professionals based on Yellow Pages listings, but because a referral leads to getting to know them on a personal basis.

"The whole concept of the faceless corporation is dead," he says. "Now, we want to know who's behind the scenes, what that person is thinking, what their life is like. That's what Doublethink is here to achieve. We're about tapping into the human, hardwired desire to connect."

Elizabeth Millard is a freelance writer specializing in business, technology, and lifestyle topics.


Photos, top to bottom:

Garrio Harrison, social media man

Doublethink corporate logo

The CoCo coworking space in Saint Paul, Doublethink's incubator and office

Harrison "doublethinking" media evolution

Doublethink's cardinal points, in Harrison's handwriting

All photos by Bill Kelley