Are on line Social Media courses trustworthy, educational and worth our while?

[Melissa Goodall]

Since we live and breath the web - is there any value in on line courses offered on Social Media?

Are these trustworthy and as educational as they should be? Will the certificates handed out be acknowledged and shouldn't an external body be regulating these often fly by night "educators" ?

[Aerin Guy]

Hi Melissa,
You ask a good question, and I think we are all working to come up with an answer. The rapid changes in technology renders a lot of material obsolete very quickly - and so much of the "right" knowledge does come with that living and breathing that you mention. I belong to another ning community discussing this particular topic. You might want to check it out, as it focuses on discussion around credentialling etc.
For what it's worth, I did an "e-marketing" certificate through the Canadian Marketing Association. It was in class, had a big, honking binder (they couldn't supply the materials online, or even through powerpoints), and had a written exam. It made the luddites in my company feel as though they were on the cutting edge. The networking was good, but the instructor was canned from his "Director of Social Media" day job during the course, so our faith in him was sullied somewhat. Let me know what you find out!

[Uwe Gutschow]

I subscribe to http://www.marketingprofs.com/ and they provide a great range of marketing topics including social media seminars that I've found quite useful. Not just basic social media, but more advanced topics like measurement, monitoring tools, etc.