A point of challenge for business looking to engage in Social Media, whether for marketing, sales or customer service, is one word; emtions. Having read an excellent post today on the Collective Thoughts blog about “empathy” in Social Media engagement, this brought to light the emotional element of Social Media.

As marketers and communicators in business know, sadness, death and misery are not great value propositions or call-outs to promote a company or service. Marketing and communications is about creating positive energy and showing a beneficial outcome. Rightfully, you want people to feel good about buying your products or services. Even a funeral home sells comfort, a more positive emotion, to families of the deceased.

People engaged in Social Media, consumers, artists, just plain potential prospects, engage in Social Media because they can say/write/show whatever they want. Many channels in Social Media can be a barometer on how people “feel” about themselves, others, products, services or their world around them.

This certainly does lead to a need to have true “empathy” when engaging in Social Media as a company as Shana Albert points out in her blog. This represents a challenge for a company, as it means by being empathetic the “organizational whole” must then develop an emotional engagement with their market. Does “emotion” then become a key component in a company’s brand strategy? Certainly a customer service department worker has to develop empathy when speaking with a customer. But how do you translate that into your overall Social Media strategy?

If you are a small or large company, people will talk about you. It may not always be positive and it may reach a very wide audience. How you respond requires empathy and an understanding of the emotional graph of the Social Mediasphere. We’re not suggesting weeping alongside your customers. But simply being aware of Social Media as a medium primarily driven by emotions, can help in the formulation and management of ones Social Media engagement.