The Atlantic posts a fascinating social media infographic focusing on the valuations of the largest social media companies. Particularly timely in the wake of LinkedIn’s recent IPO, which was the subject of an interesting New York Times piece the other day.

Well it only makes sense considering yesterday’s post. Good call on Dave’s secret sub.

I’ve always told companies that anyone who calls himself or herself a “social media expert” isn’t, and if they want you to hire them, your best move is to put your hand on your wallet and run like hell. You can have experience in the field, but you can’t have expertise in something that changes so radically so often.

Peter Shankman says what I meant far better over on Business Insider:

Being an expert in social media is like being an expert at taking the bread out of the refrigerator. You might be the best bread-taker-outer in the world, but you know what? The goal is to make an amazing sandwich, and you can’t do that if all you’ve done in your life is taken the bread out of the fridge.

Social media is just another facet of marketing and customer service. Say it with me. Repeat it until you know it by heart. Bind it as a sign upon your hands and upon thy gates. Social media, by itself, will not help you.

This is pretty good, though I’m wondering if I ought to be concerned since I don’t own any of the ironic accessories. Then again, I’m not part of the Big Agency game, so I suppose it’s all right.

The rapture was supposed to happen yesterday at about 6:00 in the evening, east coast time. Maybe that’s what that break in the clouds was; after all, we hadn’t see real sun around here for about a week.

Whether it did or didn’t happen, though, it occurred to me this morning that it was maybe one of the best guerrilla marketing efforts ever.

Check out the AIDA model posted on guerrillaonline.com: the rapture had it all. Attention? Who’s not going to pay attention when the end of the world is at hand. Interest? There’s a clear “urgency, feeling of a special situation” where the rapture is concerned. Desire? Action? Check. Check.

Hey, isn’t the goal of a successful guerrilla marketing campaign to raise attention and awareness? Well, just look at the graphic I posted above. That’s a Google Trends look at searches for the word “rapture” over the past 30 days. You’ll see similar spikes for “familyradio.com” and “Harold Camping.”

And isn’t the goal of a successful guerrilla marketing campaign to win earned media? Done and done. Everyone from CNN to the Wall Street Journal to  Reuters and everyone in between covered the story. Camping probably got more press than anyone else in 2011 this site of Charlie Sheen and Osama bin Laden.

And isn’t the goal of a successful guerrilla marketing campaign to also get people to spread the word on your behalf? Done and done. Robert Fitzpatrick is a perfect example of this campaign’s success: He spent his life’s savings of $140,000 on spreading Camping’s rapture message.

So the campaign worked. Awareness raised. Base energized. Press coverage won.

Now what?