The good news is that much of this spend will be focused on internal, social business activities.  According to the report, 65% of respondents said they have plans in place to improve and revamp social media policies, 63% have plans for integration of social media into marketing plans overall, and 59% have plans for social media monitoring and rapid response capabilities. Additionally, 46% of the respondents will be or are investing in platforms to collaborate and share best practices and 56% are planning to use social media for consumer insights and innovation.

Another key data point that I found interesting is that while 96% of social media is used for advertising;  only 75% use social media for customer support, 40% for product development and 24% for internal communication.  I am sure these numbers will increase in the future.

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Here is the full report:

Booz & Co Buddy Media Campaigns to Capabilities Social Media and Marketing 2011

Photo Credit: BigStock – Businessman pressing modern social buttons on a virtual background

I am capitalist. So whatever business you are in or whatever you want to call yourself to in order to make a living doesn’t bother me at all  – as long as it’s legal of course.  I do get a little agitated at times when someone tries to sell me a social media seminar for $13K but whatever.  I certainly don’t hate anyone and I am sure Peter Shankman was just trying to make a point when he said that, “all social media experts should go die in a fire”, although it had me laughing hysterically.

Shel Israel wrote in a post the other day and said that “social media’s disruption is pretty much over” and that social media is “normalizing inside of business.”  This is probably the first time I have ever disagreed with Shel but I have a different view. The disruption is not over – it has shifted. And, social media is far from becoming normal inside of any business operation.

Peter Kim was right.  We are moving into a new era of social business. But what does that exactly mean? Let me explain what that means to me based on my experience working in the enterprise.

Most organizations do realize the growing influence of the social customer; and they do pretty well in Facebook, Twitter and they are certainly hiring the thousands of community managers that exist today; or hiring agencies to manage their communities. Yeah, many make mistakes but for the most part, they do get it or they will get it sooner than later.  I refer to these companies as social brands (or at least they are trying to be.) Social media marketing – the way it is defined today is becoming a commodity skill set. Everyone knows how to do it – consultants, experts, PR and digital agencies and even the larger consulting firms are starting to dip their toes in.

The disruption today has nothing to do with the external nature of the brand; but everything to do with the internal dynamics of the way a business operates.

It’s not visible to most because it’s happening behind the firewall. I would go as far as saying that there is organizational chaos (and even anarchy in some cases) happening in many companies today. Big companies.

Organizational silos still exist and are alive and well today. No one knows who should own social media or which function it should report into. Marketing and PR teams are still fighting for it.  Everyone in the organizations measures social media differently. Companies are struggling to organize their teams to be the most effective. Minimal collaboration is present and being facilitated by technology; yet, business culture as a whole is resisting change. Technology decisions still take years to make, and even longer to deploy (try getting an IT manager and marketing manager in the same conference room together and agreeing on next steps of a project … yeah right).  Budgets, for the most part, are a non-existent line item.

An organization that is evolving, either willingly or forcefully into a collaborative social business is attempting to solve these problems.

The social media consultant/manager/strategist isn’t going anywhere and nothing will change in the near term.  There will always be a need to manage content, engage with the community, create advocacy programs, influencer outreach, pull metrics and the list goes on. And, most companies today can’t afford to hire entire teams internally to do this. What is changing, however, and will be a problem for many is the growing competition. Everyone and their mom is a social media expert or community manager.  But business decision-makers are getting smarter and not basing their hiring decisions on the quantity of Twitter followers or self-proclaimed titles anymore. They want business value, someone who can help them navigate through their own social business evolution.

So here is my advice. I hope it’s valuable.

If you are a social media expert, I would highly recommend you begin to learn about the enterprise and apply your social media acumen to help optimize and humanize general business operations and job functions like the following (not a comprehensive list):

• Human Resources – learn how HR teams are communicating with each other and with the business units/employees they support. Learn what technology applications they are using like to track employee/candidate data like PeopleSoft or Zoho.  Learn about their staffing/recruiting process and how they are using LinkedIn, Facebook and Google to find quality candidates.
• Learning & Organizational Development (sometimes a part of the Human Resources Function) – this is one area I wish I had learned more about when I worked on the L&D team at Sony. Learn about what type of training and curriculum is being developed for employees and what kind of change management initiatives are being rolled out to the organization. Understand if they are working with employee communications and what tools they are using to communicate (Yammer, Intranet); and what Learning Management System (LMS) is deployed.
• Supply Chain Management – learn about the process on which the storage of raw materials, WIP inventory and finished goods get from one phase to the next. Understand how orders are being taken, shipping procedures and how partners are collaborating with each other until the product becomes readily available for sale. Figure out how the use of social technologies can help streamlines these processes.
• Customer Support – learn about the technology they use to manager their call centers. What type of IVR are they using? Does it integrate with the CRM application? Is the call center outsourced? Are they using social media to solve customer problems? And, also learn about call center metrics like cost per call, customer satisfaction, first call resolution, hold times, service levels and response times – there are certainly ways that social technologies and increased collaboration can create efficiencies.
• Communications (marketing & PR) – get a high level understanding of how the two often separate organizations work together. Understand and learn about the communication gaps and examine their organizational structure. Learn about organizational models and think hard about roles/responsibilities and communication.
• Sales – learn about the sales organization.  How do they communicate with each other, partners, customers and prospects when on the road? Are they using a CRM application and does it integrate with any social applications deployed? Are sales people using Twitter or online communities to find and track leads? Better yet, does the CRM application merry the customer record to external social profiles?

At the end of the day, much of this revolves around change management. In fact, I would argue that the entire foundation upon on which a social business is built is change management. All of this other operational stuff doesn’t matter if the organization as a whole – starting with the organizational leadership – isn’t committed to changing their behavior, their culture, the way they do business.

I write at length about this very topic in my upcoming book , Smart Business, Social Business: A Playbook for Social Media in Your Organization scheduled to be released in July 2011. You can pre-order by clicking on the below social business book cover. Thank you for your support.

I write at length about this very topic in my upcoming book , Smart Business, Social Business: A Playbook for Social Media in Your Organization scheduled to be released in July 2011. You can pre-order by clicking on the below social business book cover. Thank you for your support.

One thing I am pretty good at though is building community.  I have been doing it for many years and for many different brands.  And, I can only share insights about what is working today.  And what works today may or may not necessarily work tomorrow, so please take this with a grain of salt.

Now, I hate to say “content is king” for the sake of saying “content is king” because it’s been said almost as many times as “it’s time for brands to join the conversation.”  But at the end of the day, content is what pays my bills. Content is everything on the social web — tweets, status updates, ad units, search, billboards, press releases, copy on corporate websites and blogs, etc.  But it’s more than just content! 

It’s about the right content, at the right time, to the right person in the right channel.

When a brand can achieve this, they will not only deepen community engagement, but they will create customer advocacy.  That’s why I love the social web and the tools available today. Through real time analytics, it’s very easy to identify what content (messages) clearly resonate with the community. This is one reason why Social CRM is such a hot topic right now. From an elementary point of view, Social CRM is just that – using back end, traditional CRM data coupled with external data (Twitter, Facebok) and social listening data so that brands and marketers can provide a more relevant customer experience.

When I think about content, I can’t help but think that it needs to relevant and that timing is critical. For example, when my wife and I wanted to refinance our house several years ago, I began to notice content about mortgage rates everywhere (online, print, billboard, tweets, TV). It was actually kind of scary and overwhelming at the same time. Fast forward to today and I can’t even tell you the last time I’ve seen a piece of content discussing mortgage rates. The sad reality is that it’s probably all around me, it’s just not relevant anymore. That being said, relevant content:

1. adds value to the conversation
2. positions your brand as a trusted source of information
3. is authentic and believable
4. build trust with the community
5. happens as a result of listening and acting
6. increases the reach of your messages
7. increases your “organic” search rankings
8. drives purchase intent

In a nutshell, if you add all this together — relevant content drives business value.

In my mind, there are two types of content, proactive and reactive.  Both are equally as important. Proactive content is all about outbound engagement (i.e. blogs, tweets, videos, wall posts, contests, coupons, etc.) This is content that is meant to excite and inform the community.  Reactive content deals with crisis communications, dealing with angry customers or simply saying “thank you” publicly to a fan.  

Now, most consumers are inundated with content. They live their lives in the stream and are bombarded with irrelevant content. Brian Solis refers to it as the attention dashboard.  The following diagram is an example of a customer journey and all the content that they are subjected to on a daily basis.

Key takeaway is this. According to the Edelman Trust Barometer, consumers need to hear/read/see a piece of content up to five times before they actually beleive it. And, because every customer journey is different, a brand needs to have multiple channels of relevant content for the consumer to interact with.

1. You think Twitter is going to solve all your problems: Substitute Twitter with any other tool or social network. Social media is about people and relationships. The tools come and go.
2. You work in a silo: No one else in the organization knows what you are doing.  Marketing doesn’t talk to PR and PR doesn’t talk to marketing. There are multiple programs, campaigns and contests running. No integration at all.
3. You’ve done no research: You have no idea if there are any discussions happening about your brand. Then you decide to create a Facebook fan page and management is all over you because the only fans of the page are employees of the company.
4. All you do is listen.  So you’ve signed up for ScoutLabs; good first step.  Now you are monitoring the conversations.  Better. But brands that act upon the feedback from the community are the ones who are seeing success.
5. You lack story telling.  You have no message. There is no story.  You aren’t aligned with the brand promise.  Everything is fragmented and the content distribution network doesn’t exist.

Next post will be things to include in a social media strategy.

A few months back, Burson-Marsteller conducted a study that found that 15% of Fortune 500 companies communicate with people via corporate blogs.  Only 74 Fortune 500 companies actively maintain a blog! It’s almost criminal. Now of course, a corporate blog is just one tool in the overall social universe; but I wonder how many of the other 426 companies have some presence in social media. It doesn’t have to be a blog. It could be a twitter account, Facebook page or a community hosted on/off domain.  In my opinion, companies, brands, products – whatever you want to call it – have to participate in some way. And I am not just talking about the Fortune 500 either.

Here’s why:

A study back in June showed that 55% of consumers want ongoing conversations with companies and brands. The study investigated how brands and consumers interact and how consumers want brands to engage with them. And the results were awesome. In addition to the 55% wanting an ongoing interaction, 89% of respondents said they would feel more loyal to a brand if they were invited to take part in a feedback group.

A more recent study (you can download here) found that 85% of Americans using social media think companies should have an active presence in the social media universe. What’s even more interesting is that those users actually want interaction with these companies. Here are some other nuggets that might be useful.

Out of the 85% of people who want companies to be present in social media:

• 34% want companies to actively interact with them
• 51% want companies to interact with them as needed or by request
• 8% think companies should only be passively involved on social media
• 7% think companies should not be involved at all

More on customer service via social media:

• 43% would like to see companies offering customer service through social media
• 41% would like companies to solicit feedback
• 37% would like companies to provide new ways to interact with the brand via social media

While valid, these are just two studies with a bunch of numbers and percentages and don’t really mean anything.  I have experienced real situations in social media where, as a customer, I have had great interactions with companies and brands looking to build community and/or address customer support questions (see Twitter / Geek Squad case study). And even though they couldn’t fix my laptop, I have used their services since then and more importantly, I have told others about my positive experience.

And this is not an isolated incident. Savvy companies today are using social media to listen, talk, energize and build strong relationships with people. It’s happening everyday with companies like Dell and Zappos to name a few.

Companies cannot and should not be introverted and walk through life with their heads down.  They need to seek out every opportunity and every touch point to interact with their customers, especially in this new channel that we call social media.

The new interim board has been charted to address several key organizational and strategic deliverables, including development of membership goals, acceleration of local chapter development, increase in adoption of industry standards and implementation of a new legal structure to enhance future growth … The board will also focus on increasing its research efforts and strengthening relationships with other organizations such as the Society for New Communications Research (SNCR) and the International Association for Business Communicators (IABC). The interim board’s work will be completed once the club reorganizes as a new entity, and holds an election amongst its members for a formal Board of Directors.

Also, I will get to work with several key, industry-leading social media analysts, bloggers and business leaders, many of whom I already know; and looking forward to meeting and working with the ones I don’t know.

• Lee Aase – Social Media University, Global
• Rohit Bhargava – Influential Marketing Blog and Personality Not Included
• Richard Binhammer – RichardatDell
• Michael Brito – Britopian and Conversations Matter
• Chris Brogan – ChrisBrogan.com
• Mike Chapman – Austin Social Media Club and Every Dot Connects
• Megan Cole – MeganCole.org
• Alex de Carvalho – alexdc.org and Social Object
• Todd Defren – SHIFT Communications and www.pr-squared.com
• Serena Ehrlich – Business Wire
• Jason Falls – Social Media Explorer
• Maggie Fox – Social Media Group
• Jon Gatrell – spatiallyrelevant.org
• Howard Greenstein – HowardGreenstein.com
• Francine Hardaway – Stealthmode
• Josh Hallett – Hyku
• Annie Heckenberger – pikpr.blogspot.com and redspurs.com
• Chuck Hester – Intellicontact
• Chris Heuer – ChrisHeuer.com
• Sherry Heyl – Mind Blogging
• Tara Hunt – HorsePigCow
• Bill Johnston – Forum One
• Jennifer McClure – Society for New Communications Research
• Mike McGrath – Dogpatch Dispatch
• Jake McKee – CommunityGuy.com and Ant’s Eye View
• Gregory Narain – SocialTwister
• Lee Odden – Online Marketing Blog and TopRank
• Erica OGrady – ReinventingErica.com and Peanut Butter Media
• Jeremiah Owyang – Web Strategist
• David Parmet – Marketing Begins At Home, LLC and PerkettPR
• Jackie Peters – heavyBlog
• Pierre-Yves Platini – Yoono
• Douglas Pollei – Pollei.com
• Connie Reece – Every Dot Connects and Austin Social Media Club
• Chris Saad – ChrisSaad.com
• Andy Sernovitz – Word of Mouth Marketing and GasPedal
• Brian Solis – PR2.0
• J.J. Toothman – jjtoothman.net and Red Pill
• Todd Van Hoosear – Tech PR Gems
• Des Walsh – Des Walsh dot Com
• Kristie Wells – KristieWells.com

I will keep y’all updated as we begin to form committees and start working on projects. In the meantime, if you want to learn more about social media or just get involved with the club, I encourage you to do so.

Just yesterday, Reem asked a similar question on her blog – What’s more important: a million impressions or 5 relationships? — which was originally asked by Joe Marchese, President of SocialVibe, during a panel at the OMMA Social conference in New York. According to Reem, he was specifically asking this question about those who actively participate in social media. It was a great question that many marketers struggle with today; and if we are talking about social media users only, I echo this sentiment loudly. That is, real relationships matter more in social media, much more than millions of impressions.

If the question was directed at all web users in general (not just social media); that brings up a whole new set of variables. One variable being, the complexity for organizations that use multiple communication channels; yet want to maintain one voice with one high level strategy and multiple measurements of success. This is an issue that many corporate marketers have to deal with and it’s not as easy as one would think.

From the outside looking in, the answer might seem clear.

• Organizations need to be aligned in their communication strategy.
• Companies need to integrate their go-to-market strategies.
• Internal communication, planning and collaboration is the key.

Unfortunately, organizational silos exist so it’s not always that easy. Nonetheless, I would argue that social media may not always have to align with every other marketing activity, namely direct response marketing where conversions are the number one metric. Still, it doesn’t hurt to over communicate internally.

At HP, I managed search and social media for North America. My marketing objectives were to drive awareness and consideration for HP products and services (printers, scanners, All-in-Ones, Digital Cameras, etc.). My colleague and friend, Paul O’Brien managed interactive marketing for HP Shopping. While we talked, communicated and partied quite often, he had no interest at all in the engagement metrics that I was measured by; and I had no interest at all for his VERY STRICT CPA (Cost per acquisition) goals either. Nonetheless, it was nice to understand his strategy and go-to-market plans; and of course we always looked for opportunities to collaborate.

So to address the original question of “What’s more important: a million impressions or 5 relationships? and considering that I am referring to all web users in general, I would say it depends who you ask. Paul would say impressions and then narrow it down to a click-through rate – conversion rate – revenue per keyword – cost per acquisition – blah blah blah. Yes, he is THAT ANALYICAL. For me it was about engagement, relationships, conversational sentiment and tone; and I could care less about the clicks and impressions.

I would also say that the users who were browsing HP Shopping were “ready to buy” and could care less about engagement and conversations at that precise moment; which is probably a common scenario for most e-commerce related businesses, where users do want to be sold something.

Groundswell is a comprehensive approach that helps marketers define their social media marketing strategy and has several key components like the Social Technographics Ladder of Participation, the POST method and social objectives to name a few.

The social media objectives revolve around 5 key concepts:

• Listening – using social media as “real time” research and gaining insights from listening to customers
• Talking – using conversations with customers to promote products or services
• Energizing – building brand stewardship; and identifying enthusiastic customers and using them to persuade others
• Supporting – making it possible for customers to help each other
• Embracing – turning customers into a resource for innovation

And, depending on the objectives, marketers can then decide on which social media tools to use (the T of the Post Method) to achieve those specific objectives. In many cases, organizations may use a multitude of tools to get maximum penetration in the market. Here is a really good resource of products, services and agencies that can help corporate clients achieve some or all of the objectives listed above.

Also, here is a tool that allows you to identify your customer’s social technographic profile. It’s extremely helpful.

What are your Social Media Objectives?