The story that is Ravi Singh and his galloping round the world continues. Since his spell in Ireland helping Fine Gael (Many in party HQ crew could not wait to see the back of him) Ravi has moved on to Turkey and other countries, in fact anyone that will pay him to either speak or work for them.
However Ravi’s international travels have not gone completely smoothly. Politico.com has been having a look. In Poland some pesky but determined journalists kept digging about the Obama claims that he has been allowing go uncorrected for years. Singh has had to take down a video where he was referred to as an Obama campaign guru.
To be clear he has worked for a US state democratic party Obama campaign in a VERY small way. He was sacked by a gubnertorial campaign for messing up a campaign website. And we remember what happened with the Fine Gael website pre #ge11. Those who hired him in Columbia are very surprised to hear that he did not work for Obama.
And thanks to Fine Gael’s campaign Euro’s Ravi posts pictures like this on his
twitter account and claims his role in Fine Gael’s electoral victory.
Next stop Guatemala. where Ravi Singh is charging up to 100 dollars a seat (that’s a lot of money in Central America) to hear him talk all about Facebook and campaigns (maybe with gems like where Fine Gael deleted negative posts and temporarily closed down accounts which challenged them – will he mention twolicy?). And where the media uncorrected by Singh continue to mention him as an Obama guru.
In fairness, Suzy, most of the people who sell themselves as “experts” on “social media” and “internet marketing” in Ireland have zero real experience of either. For example one of the leading pro bloggers in Ireland who sells consultancy professionally has maybe a year of an engineering degree, zero experience of marketing anything aside from since starting up as a consultant, and no real world experience of marketing of sales, or even any kind of academic background that might at least indicate some awareness of positioning or strategic planning. In reality, the guy is a former sys admin with a bit of activism experience but no agressive sales background of the sort that would indicate a powerful ability to create interests (google Cindy Gallop for an example of somebody with a hugely succesful advertising background who has a deep understanding of social trends and the realtionship with technology).
Anybody can set themselves up as an expert on internet marketing, and unfortunately that includes lots of amateurs who believe that the statistics you get from Google etc are meaningful. They are only partial views of a highly complex social reality.
Its not surprising in this world of hype about social media that gurus like Singh can pass himself off as the main who made Obama, literally most people with a social media marketing “background” pretty much do the same albeit on a much less audacious level.
“has maybe a year of an engineering degree”…
With the greatest of respect, Laura, I’m not sure there is a degree that’s relevant to a field as nebulous as social media, in the same way that there’s no single degree that’s relevant to: consultancy, speechwriting, advocacy, lobbying, etc.
This person has created a niche for himself based on skill in the area: he consults and helps a number of individuals and companies in a highly competitive field. His business depends entirely on word of mouth and the feeling that the client got value of money. If they didn’t, then he wouldn’t be in business. Simple as.
Fine Gael terminate relationship with Ravi Singh // Jun 19, 2011 at 18:18
[...] Of course regular readers may not be surprised at all by my interest in this turn of events at all at all. (I am permitted a grin here – a very wide one.) [...]
Fine Gael launch Facebook treaty app | It Only Encourages Them // May 2, 2012 at 16:29
[...] At the outset i was worried about this app considering the recent clusterfucks that have been Fine Gael’s forays into social media electioneering as witnessed by the cringeworthy Twolicy and that insufferable charlatan Ravi Singh. [...]