Every now and then I read or hear something that leaves me shaking my head in dismay. That happened today when reading a piece on Search Engine Watch titled, Top 5 Reasons Why SMBs Should Fear Social Media.

Aside from the link-bait headline, it was the last item that led to my dismay. Under the label, “Advertising, Marketing & Public Relations Agencies That Have Hung a Social Media Shingle,” author Tim Judd writes…

It doesn’t mean they understand content that engages, promotes, or converts prospects to customers. “There are very few experts in social media,” (Killer Facebook Ads author Marty) Weintraub said. “It takes a lot of time and work to develop such expertise, especially now that social communities are turning off the ability to market to anyone other than friends.”

In its blurb linking to the article, the Smart Brief on Social Media added, “Self-described social media “experts” often don’t know what they’re talking about, so it’s important to keep a close eye on whoever is running your social strategy.”

Why the dismay? If you have to be told this about any contractor, you have no business being in business.

Once you have established a relationship and built a bond of trust, of course, you can ease off your oversight. But when a relationship is new, it doesn’t matter if you’ve hired a social media expert, an accountant, a graphic designer or an engineer. It doesn’t matter how sparkling the references were, how impressive the resume was or how blown away you were by their presentation or proposal. You can’t rely entirely on the due diligence you performed, allowing the contractor to work in a vacuum.

It’s your brand and yours and your organization’s reputation that are at stake. Monitoring the activities of any agency, freelancer or contractor is a fundamental obligation for anybody working in the world of business. (Recognizing this from my own days managing communications departments and consulting practices, I always build regular project reviews into the timeline of any proposal. If the people you’re hiring haven’t done that, insist that they do.)

This issue has bugged me ever since the social media consultant bashing began several years ago. Are those tasked with social media really so lacking in basic business skills that they can’t figure this out? If you can’t evaluate a contractor’s capabilities before hiring him, how in the world did you get hired into a position that requires you to make such decisions in the first place? As it is in the consumer world, caveat emptor: buyer beware.