Some of the books that have been published about social media over the last couple of years have undermined their own message by yelling at their audience.The authors believe that Web 2.0 is a hammer and every marketing problem is a nail. Marketers who aren’t getting on board with social media are either in denial or stupid.

This attitude ultimately works against these enthusiasts. Social media isn’t a panacea for anything and it isn’t even appropriate for some companies and markets. The challenge for marketers is to figure out what makes sense and how to build social campaigns into broader marketing programs.

Groundswell takes a constructive approach to the task. Written by Forrester Research analysts Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff, it’s the first social media book I’ve read that attempts to define an analytical and quantitative approach to evaluating and applying social media . While the authors’ bias is clear, their approach is dispassionate enough to make their message all the more persuasive. In that respect, this is a breakthrough book.

You would expect nothing less than a quality job from two Forrester analysts. Li and Bernoff propose an innovative model for online adult behavior at the outset and apply it consistently throughout. Their “Social Technographics Profile” is a breakdown of US adults into six categories spanning the spectrum of online participation ranging from uninvolved to active creator. The authors apply the profile to a variety of audience segments, demonstrating that not all markets adopt Web 2.0 the same way. They’ve also made a limited version of the profiling tool available on the book’s website.

Importantly, Groundswell takes pains to point out that social media isn’t for everyone. Companies with undifferentiated or commodity products that don’t inspire customer enthusiasm are going to be hard pressed to build word-of-mouth momentum or brand advocacy. For them, a support forum or thought-leadership blog may be the best value they’ll get. It’s all about matching the customer base to the appropriate online behavior profile, and the authors drive home that message again and again. This book is all about understanding Social Technographics.

Groundswell is rich in case studies, many of which were evidently gleaned from client interactions and reflect solid understanding of the business issues at hand. The book also takes the best shot I’ve seen at defining an ROI model for blogs and social networks. The story of how one customre enthusiast has saved Dell more than $1 million in customer support costs is particularly compelling.

I was somewhat chagrined to find that some of the case studies I write about in my forthcoming book, Secrets of Social Media Marketing, are also covered in Groundswell. Fortunately, the two books have very different objectives. Secrets is applied practice while Groundswell is more strategic. The fact that we both landed on so many of the same examples is perhaps proof that this market still has a lot of growing up to do.