It’s official: the job of handling conversations online is a REAL JOB!

Social media guru, Jeremiah Owyang has started a list showing the emergence of people filling the roles of Social Computing Strategists and Community Managers in the larger corporations.

And ok, it may look US and tech industry-centric now, but the Web knows no geographical boundaries (erm, well maybe China) and the conversations about you and your business can be happening online anytime, anywhere.

The trick is knowing a) they’re out there and b) how to handle it.

Now you’ve got your head around blogs, park that as we’re on to the next big thing: comment tracking. The phrase is my invention (in a futile bid for cultural buzz word fame) but it’s a convenient shorthand for describing the world of CoComment, an online service for collecting in one place all contributions you make to conversations across the web. It tracks comments on your comments and, for bloggers, captures all their extra-blog activity on their own pages.

Leading French blogger, Loic Le Meur, hails this as a new dawn for commentators, who could end up as influential as TV pundits.

His closing comments on the importance of online conversations in consumer choice are a wake up call for brands.