I am not talking to people on this forum, I am talking to one of my clients. No matter how much I give him advice and examples of how to write and engaging blog post or encourage him to find his own voice when talking about the products and services his company offers, he falls back to making each post a sales pitch. This is when I can't decide what would be more beneficial, banging my head against a wall or banging his against the pavement.

He will not understand that the heart and soul of social media is the engagement and conversation with the potential client (he refers to them as suspects, another choice of words on his part that makes me question his sanity). Has anyone else encountered this type of ingrained stubborness and if so what did you do to alleviate the pain? Any suggestions would be welcome.

Oh yes... Especially with people who are from the traditional marketing mindset or even the bloggers' mindset. There needs to be a change of attitude first for your client to really modify his behavior. I dont think your client is the only faulty one. Just a look at many tweets in the tweetosphere and you will see many are still in this boat. So how can this be changed? Good question. I recommend sending him short email snippets or examples of how other businesses successfully created a two way conversation and generated more money!!! That may be the remedy.

While your advice is excellent it was already tried and sadly it failed to penetrate. I think the problem is that he went from managing a small electronics retailer to starting up a company on his own. He experienced a good run of success and believed that since he was successful he had little to learn in terms of marketing. Now that he is facing a make or break point he will not change his mindset nor will he admit that he may have made some bad decisions and it is time to step back and take a new path. I fear that in 2 to 3 years his company will cease to exist because while his competitors are accepting changes and adapting to new mindsets he is receding into a cocoon of memories of past success. I guess I can take solace in the fact that after years of experience I can see the situation for what it is and insulate myself from being part of the collateral damage.