As a student of sociology (that’s what my undergraduate degree was in), I welcomed the opportunity to review the newest book by Ric Dragon of DragonSearch,  Social Marketology -- Improve Your Social Media Processes and Get Customers to Stay Forever.

This book promised to help businesses discover patterns in social media (not sure that small businesses have the time and/or energy for this), focus on desired outcomes, humanize their brand, identify their customers, and create an action plan.  It also promised to discuss how to avoid social media mistakes and how to improve the social media marketing process.  Did it deliver?

The answer, in simple terms, is no.  In fact, this book does nothing in simple terms.  From the discussion of marketing and psychology texts written as far back as the 1800s to the discussion of a study conducted by efficiency experts Lillian and Frank Gilbreth in 1910, this book outlines the history of psychology and sociology as it may relate to social media marketing.

Most chapters within this book offer a detailed background of marketing and how it may relate to today's digital efforts, but almost none of them provide those real-world examples that assist business owners in transitioning theory into practice.  In fact, the one chapter that I found the most useful, Egg on Your Face: Avoiding the Big Mistakes did an excellent job of discussing some of the most recent twitter and Facebook gaffes that occurred before the publishing of this book, it did nothing to really explain how those things could have been avoided. 

In fact, throughout this book, I was unable to find any real-world suggestions of how to implement some of the tactics this book professed to offer.

In the end, this book would make a great textbook within any social and digital marketing theory class offered within the most prestigious university.  But, as a business book looking to assist the business owner in advancing their social and digital marketing efforts, this book falls far short.