Social Business - is your company ready to go beyond pilots?

 To continue the theme of talking about readiness to adopt Social Business, let's take a deeper dive into the maturity element that was highlighted in the HBR article "Taking Social Media from Talk to Action".     "For many companies, social media use is still viewed as an experiment." There is a Social Business maturity curve for companies, which should drive their focus areas.  Let's look at companies at both ends of the maturity curve.

• For companies just starting this journey, their focus should be on defining their strategy and future goals.  As a secondary phase, they could begin to experiment with justifying value using pilots.   That's terrific, and should be encouraged.

• Companies that already understand their Social Business strategy typically understand the inhibitors/ actions that need to be taken.  They have taken the time to understand the value, and often have the benefit of pilot results.  The challenge?  Many identified inhibitors are very hard to solve, and require company wide transformational actions.  Examples include the elements discussed in my previous blog posts:  Strategy, Culture, Demonstration of Business Value, Funding, Training, etc.   The question then becomes ... how and when do you get out of pilot mode?  It takes significant company commitment to implement a pilot solution across the enterprise.  If you leave it to the typical company processes, these large transformational investments require inclusion into the yearly Financial planning cycles ... which could delay roll-out for a year.  With the changing landscape, the solution will be seriously behind competition and are at risk of de-prioritization against current needs.

Getting beyond pilot mode is the next real challenge.  It's easy for executives to say 'Yeah, we're doing that'.  In reality, it's been a successful pilot that relies heavily on passionate volunteers in their spare time.  What is needed is a new way to think about prioritization of enterprise wide scaling.  This is an area that is yet to be solved, but it's becoming recognized that a new business  model needs to emerge quickly.  If it doesn't, then the risk is that small start up companies (who have the flexibility, are agile, and have access to Investment sources) can gain some of your current market share.

Couple of ideas have surfaced, but this is definitely still work in progress.    Below are some 'food for thought' ideas in this area.  I welcome your thoughts and suggestions!

• Consider the investment as part of the sales and marketing budget, rather than through the typical  POR (Plan of Record) budgets (i.e. IT spending, HR training, existing strategy).  Maybe this could be thought of as more of an investment case for a new Social Business revenue opportunity?
  
• Perhaps a business justification based on the risk of not fully participating?  This would not be the typical investment to revenue case, but rather an investment to protect a loss in current revenue streams..

Taking the step out of pilot mode is a difficult one.  The companies that transform their culture and fully embrace Social Business benefits and enterprise wide investments will take a leadership position in this significant emerging market opportunity.

Social Business - is your company ready with a supporting culture?

To continue the theme of talking about readiness to adopt Social Business, let's take a deeper dive into the culture element that was highlighted in the HBR article "Taking Social Media from Talk to Action".     "Many organizations seem to operate under old paradigms, viewing social media as one-way flow marketing messages, instead of capitalizing on the opportunity to monitor, analyze, and participate in the millions of conversations between consumers"    In my opinion, there are two main drivers to this:

1. Companies are not listening to what is being said about them
2. Employees are not given 'permission' to engage in a dialog with customers because the perceived risk is too high

In terms of listening, the HBR article points out that "...while more than half are using social media, only about one-quarter of users said they could identify where their most valuable customers are “talking” about them. And, less than one-quarter (23%) are using any form of social media analytic tools, with only 5% using some form of customer sentiment analysis."    Why is this?  You would think that companies could just buy an off the shelf listening capability.  However, it's not that simple.  This is an example of culture change that needs to start with long term commitment.  This commitment needs to include transformational changes including training, resource allocation, funding prioritization and on-going management focus.  While there is significant benefit to listening and engaging with your customers, it could be a bigger risk if you start down that path and then are not prepared to support your end of the conversation.  Listening is the first step to engagement.  Is your company ready to fully support all aspects of the response you will be sure to get?

To the second point above, let's say that companies have established a listening capability.  Typically, Social Media managers will monitor the conversations and route them to the appropriate employee for engagement.  Are your employees ready to engage (beyond the small number of external communications professionals)?  Have they been given 'permission' to speak on behalf of their company by their management?  Are they adequately trained?  Do they know where to go for help and support if required?  On the surface, this also looks easy ... but in reality it takes culture change. It requires trust and a willingness to accept risk (with appropriate mitigation in place like training).

It easy to leverage social within the boundaries of the old paradigm, but that's not Social Business.  It's a journey, but the rewards can be significant.

Social Business - is your company ready with a strategy?

In my last blog post, I highlighted some interesting topic areas that companies should consider as they get ready for the new Social Business era.  

Here, I'd like to take a deeper look at Social Business Strategy.  The "Taking Social Media from Talk to Action" HBR article provides a statistic that is concerning:  "Two-thirds of users have no formalized social media strategy in place.... many organizations’ activities seem more focused on “making noise” about their company and products, and less on understanding and participating in the conversations already going on about them on the Web."  Why is that?  Perhaps their competitors are 'doing something' in this space which compels them to 'do something' quickly?  Maybe they decide just to start a pilot in this space to better understand it.   Some may realize that it could be very difficult to stop a pilot in this space once companies open the 'social doors' to their customers.  Fast is good.  Collaboration is good.   But ... it will just be about 'making noise' until companies understand how to channel this goodness into Social Business value.  It all starts with strategy, followed closely by an understanding of the long term investment and business value it will drive. 


OK - now your company understands need to create a Social Business Strategy.  What are some key elements that should be considered?  Here are some areas to think about: 

• Have you listened to what your customers are saying about your company?  How about what they are saying about your competitors?  Do you see opportunities and/or gaps?
• How does your company collaborate with customers today?  If you gave them more of a 'voice', where could that drive benefit for your company?  Sales?  Development?  Service?
• If you had a community that supported your company, how could they help drive more sales?  How could you reward this type of behavior?
• In addition to thinking about collaboration externally, are there efficiencies and benefits that could be gained through employee usage of social media internally?

These are just some questions that companies should ask themselves as they develop strategies to leverage social for business purposes.  Of course, you need to develop and measure success criteria to understand what is working, and what needs to change.  I'll pass along some good advice that I received .... this is a marathon, not a sprint.  If you demonstrate continued passion and focus on the customer in support of business goals, the benefits will follow. 

Social Business - is your company ready?

Harvard Business review released an interest report entitled:  "The New Conversation:  "Taking Social Media from Talk to Action".   It provides some very insightful data about what companies think about the new Social age, what their current maturity level is, and what their concerns are going forward.  If you have an interest in this area, it's worth a read.

This report highlights a couple of very interesting topic areas:

• Strategy:  "Two-thirds of users have no formalized social media strategy in place.... many organizations’ activities seem more focused on “making noise” about their company and products, and less on understanding and participating in the conversations already going on about them on the Web."
  
•  Culture:  "Many organizations seem to operate under old paradigms, viewing social media as one-way flow marketing messages, instead of capitalizing on the opportunity to monitor, analyze, and participate in the millions of conversations between consumers"
  
• Maturity:  "For many companies, social media use is still viewed as an experiment."
  
•  Budget:  "Just 20% of social media users have a dedicated budget for their social media activities, with marketing controlling that budget in almost half the companies ... This reflects just how experimental many organizations view social media and how they have been reluctant to commit resources, perhaps because they are still not certain of its goals, effectiveness, and impact on the organization.
  
• Demonstration of business value:  “It’s hard to define value when we are still trying to measure it. We will get it eventually, but right now we are stabbing in the dark for measurement criteria.”

 As I reflect on the important topics above, here ares some others that companies should think about as they move from talk to action:  

• Blurring of personal and company persona:   As companies start to encourage and enable employee participation in social media to drive business value, it's important to consider how to or if employees should include their personal social interactions with social business discussions. 
  
• Company risk profile:  Enabling employee participation in social discussions does come with risk.  Companies need to think about what is the risk/benefit tradeoff ... and how does that align with their companies values. 

It's evident that Social Business is driving a paradigm shift for many companies, just as it was in the e-business era.   To fully embrace Social Business, companies need to seriously consider cross-company transformational changes to their culture and business processes. This paradigm shift could effect HR, Legal, Finance, CIO and product development organizations.  It's a fundamental change in the way we work. 

These are exciting times with great opportunities!  Is your company ready for them?

I'll talk more about each of the areas above in future blog posts.  I welcome your thoughts and feedback.

Social Business - customer perception becomes business reality

IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV) recently published very insightful report titled:  From Social Media to Social CRM.  Based on extensive survey results from both consumers and business executives, IBV uncovered significant gaps between what customers want and businesses think they want in their social media engagement.  Consumers desire tangible value such as coupons and discounts, while businesses feel that they want to learn about new products.  The table below highlights the significant perception gap.

Note: Consumer: N=1056; Business: Learn N=333, General info N=336, Submit opinion N=334, Exclusive info N=333, Reviews/rankings N=333, Feel connected N=331,
Customer service N=331, Submit ideas N=332, Community N=329, Event N=332, Purchase N=334, Discounts N=331.
Source: IBM Institute for Business Value analysis. CRM Study 2011.

Most customers want to use social media for personal reasons ... to connect with friends and family, not with companies. Consumers are willing to interact with businesses if they believe it is to their benefit.  Have you noticed that many successful social media campaigns often include some type of prize or incentive?  Even recent TV commercials feature stories where customers who tweet about their brand are surprised with prizes in coffee shops or airports.   While that is an interesting business tactic to introduce customers to social media, it can get expensive and have questionable long term returns.

Survey results show that businesses are three times more likely to think consumers are interested in interacting with them to feel part of a community.  It's clear that businesses are overestimating consumers’ desire to engage with them to feel connected to their brand.   In reality, these two activities are among the least interesting from a consumer’s perspective. 

So ... what does this data tell business executives?  First - they should assure that they are getting continuous direct consumer feedback about their social media initiatves.   Are they working?  What needs to change?  What is the perceived value to the customer (as compared to the expected value from the company's perspective)?  As the report suggests, businesses need to stay laser focused on customer value to avoid falling into the perception gaps they've uncovered.

If you are interested in the Social business area, this report is definitely worth the time to read.  I welcome your insights ... and perceptions :-)

Is Social Media Employee Training is overrated?

I stumbled across a very insightful blog post called Empowering Your Employees May Solve Your Content Problems.  It talks about the idea that employee training is overrated ... what is really needed is management permission to try things. 

Is employee training overrated?  My first reaction was that training is often touted as the mitigation to many social media risks.  Worried about leakage of confidential information?  Training is the answer.  Worried about inappropriate employee behavior that could impact your brand image?  Training is the answer.   You get the point ... training is often the answer to many Social Media concerns.  It can't be overrated ..... or can it?

When you think about training ...

• is it about how to use Social Media?  The user interfaces are fairly self explanatory...  
• is it about following Business Conduct Guidelines?  This should be about acting professionally, and not doing anything 'stupid', which should be expected of all employees...
• is it about getting the majority of employees to have a consistent social messaging?  While this is valuable to a point, companies have to make sure their social conversations are not perceived only as glorified marketing channels...

If employees would take some time and 'jump in' to social media conversations, they would quickly be able to train themselves on most of the items above.  What is holding many of them back?   According to the referenced article: "What they need is ownership approval to practice, and the flexibility in their daily work agenda to have the available time to create digital content." 

So, maybe Employee training is overrated.  What IS needed is Management training ... at all levels. Maybe the focus should be on Social Media Management Training.  This does come up in various feedback, but is often not prioritized.  If we focus on Management Training, employee usage will follow.  Food for thought :-)

Unlock the power of internal conversations

Most companies have an internal capability to collaborate between employees.  Some have sophisticated social tools that enable their employees to share information within the firewall, while others have manual processes.  To be successful in Social Business:    Internal Conversations + Social Media = Sales Conversations.  As discussed in this referenced blog post, companies should start slowly on this journey.  Start with an agile process that enables fast learning and iteration.  Select specific target areas, assure policies are in place and understood, and measure results.  Over time, with management encouragement, this will drive a culture shift for employees towards open collaboration externally.

For me personally, I am beginning this shift.  When I want to start an internal community/team discussion, I ask myself:  Will we be talking about anything confidential?  If not, would the conversation have higher value if shared externally?  Surprisingly, in many cases the answer is that an externally community could provide additional value and insights.  The next challenge is to get everyone on the team comfortable with open collaboration externally.  It's a slow shift, but I see it beginning to happen.   I'd encourage everyone to begin that thought process and be an early adopter. It's a journey .. the first step is the hardest.