Social Business? I Have Just the Award for You

Filed under Uncategorized by Aaron Pearson on 7 June 2011 at 20:02 {no comments}

Constellation Research announced its new Constellation SuperNova Awards yesterday, and yours truly is the PR agency lead and on the judging panel for the Social Business category.  I’d love for you to submit your work!

Constellation Research is the firm of a long-time analyst friend of mine, R. “Ray” Wang, who managed to make it cool to be an enterprise software analyst at Forrester Research, before joining Altimeter and now leading Constellation. He’s recognized the hard work involved in being truly transformative with technology, so he’s created a great new award program for leaders who have overcome the odds to successfully apply emerging and disruptive technologies for their organizations.  In addition to Social Business, there are also categories for Cloud Computing, Mobile Enterprise, Emerging Tech, and Advanced Analytics.

In April I had the opportunity to co-teach a social media marketing class at the University of St. Thomas in downtown Minneapolis for their executive education program. While it was hopefully not a complete waste of time for the students, I know it was a great experience for me because it forced me to go beyond my own direct experiences to pay more attention to world-class work out there, whether Weber Shandwick had anything to do with it or not, and to give some deeper thought to the common threads those programs shared.

One of those threads is the right kind of internal champion. I did a book review post here on Empowered, by Josh Bernoff and Ted Schadler, which talked a lot about how to nurture HEROs in your organization. These Highly Empowered and Resourceful Operatives can be truly transformative in the ways they use social technology and concepts to transform the business if management and IT supports them. It’s a reminder of how the concept of social business is so much more than about marketing communications. It can encompass training, customer service, product development, employee communications, and of course marketing.

I think it’s fair to say that in the Social Business category, the Constellation SuperNova Awards are about recognizing those HERO leaders. Joining me on the judging panel to select these rock stars of Social Business is, fittingly, a real all-star group:

  • Jeff Ashcroft, VP, Constellation Research
  • Barney Beal, Managing Editor, Tech Target
  • Paul Greenberg, President, The 56 Group, LLC
  • Esteban Kolsky, Founder, ThinkJar
  • Marshall Lager, Managing Principal, Third Idea Consulting
  • David Myron, Editor-in-Chief, CRM Magazine
  • Jon Schwartz, Technology Reporter, USA Today

The submission process: Web-based and simple

The site: Here

The deadline: July 31

Go to it.

You’re Not Marketing to a “B”, so How Well Do You Know Your “P”?

Filed under Soap Box by Aaron Pearson on 3 October 2010 at 23:52 {no comments}

Do we do enough research into our target audiences?  What are they reading, who are they listening to, who do they trust, why do they buy, what do they care about? Consumer marketers do.  I don’t think we do enough.  Why isn’t it as culturally ingrained in B2B marketing communications programs to get the kind of research to really profile our audiences that way?  Maybe we think we’re selling to companies or institutions.

“The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.”
Peter F. Drucker

We’re not. We like to go on and on about how B2B is different than B2C, but the fact is, who’s the B?  It’s a person. Actually, it’s probably a team of people. And as such they’re all different and they relate with each other in complicated ways, with a mix of respect, trust, suspicion, envy, aspirations and worries. And every B you target presents a different mix of such people. As Jason Falls of Social Media Explorer has said, “B2B is more P2P – people to people.” We’ve got to get into their heads and sort these relationships, motivations and interests all out so we have some chance of getting all those Ps to give our products or services a chance.

Every day I preach how we need to explain in a clear and compelling way how that product should resonate with the ever-evolving critical business challenges of the industry being targeted. But that really isn’t enough. We need to resonate with regular people. Our P2P-focused social media tools only make this more apparent.

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Predictions for B2B Social Media Use in 2010

Filed under Discussion by Kate Brodock on 3 January 2010 at 19:33 {4 comments}

As the last in my series of 2010 prediction posts, here are some of my thoughts looking forward to the next year in B2B social media use.

  1. Social media use will grow horizontally in the B2B space. This means there will be a lot more industries that will be represented on social media than there have been thus far.  And we’re talking a lot more industries like cementing or manufacturing.
  2. Because of the horizontal and first-time occurrences mentioned above, it also means there will be some industries that will be under-represented in the social media sphere, but that will develop front runners who will get significant advantages within those respective industries.
  3. While being more accepted, there will be more boundaries placed on how many B2B industries us social media.  There won’t be so much “stuff” to play with because implementers will realize that there are particular tools that are more helpful for B2B purposes, and that there are many tools that just won’t work.
  4. Social media will be used heavily for internal use in the B2B space.
  5. There will be a lot more multimedia uses, specifically video.
  6. As for all social media marketing, it will be a question of how to interact with people rather than simply where.  This goes a long with the idea of strategy trumping tactics, but it really emphasizes putting together a fuller picture of what can be done with social media tools in B2B and applying in a more focused way.

What do you think will happen in the next year?

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Using Social Media in the Banking and Financial Sectors

Filed under Resources by Kate Brodock on 9 November 2009 at 21:10 {10 comments}

Allan wrote a post in July on building a social media marketplace in financial services.  There have been a few posts in recent news that highlight this issue of using social media concepts and tools in the banking and financial sectors, so I thought I’d take a moment to highlight a few.

  • Banks & Social Media – Will Slow & Steady Win the Race? (B2B Bliss) “It’s clear social media is changing the industry.  But, engagement is a different story.  Regulations and compliance issues still hamper many banks from embracing the truly “open transparency” social media requires.”
  • 5 Ways Banks are Using Social Media (Mashable) “By embracing the most popular tools available, the industry has also been embracing the best of what social media culture has to offer, and smaller, community banks seem to be leading the charge when it comes to social media innovation.”

Update: An article with thoughts from some one of our readers, @podcaststeve, “Bankers conference highlights opportunities, pitfalls of social networking” (In NJBIZ)

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Community is Like a Dinner Party

Filed under Discussion, Guest Post by Kate Brodock on 24 June 2009 at 08:34 {no comments}

This is a guest post by Rachel Happe, the Principal and co-Founder of The Community Roundtable, a peer network for community managers and social media practitioners.

Most of us have heard some version of “Social Media/Twitter is like a Cocktail Party” and while this is hardly a new meme, I wanted to add my perspective because a party is not a party is not a party. I have a soapbox topic that is related which is social media is not community – even though it may share many of the same characteristics.  To me it is like saying a cocktail party is not a dinner party – most people would agree.  I like both as an individual but one represents my circle of acquaintances and the other represents people with whom I have more intimate relationships. For business, that is very similar to a marketing funnel – and depending on what type of business you are in, one may be more important than the other. In particular, if you are marketing to businesses rather than individuals, the deeper relationships engendered by “dinner parties” are critical to your marketing efforts.
There are a few characteristics of a good dinner party that make it special and different:

  • The food and wine are typically more elaborate and sophisticated
  • Your attention is focused on a small set of guests all evening
  • The music is mellow to allow for in depth conversations
  • Guests are introduced to other people they are likely to enjoy meeting
  • The host or hostess mixes things up, ensures the conversation keeps moving, and draws out their guests
  • You put out your best dinnerware

Done well, the host of a dinner party makes their guests feel welcome, comfortable, interesting, and desirable. It is a pretty good ‘tool’ for establishing closer relationships with people and making them want to stay friend with you.

What can businesses learn? Sure, throw a lot of cocktail parties (i.e. use social media tools), you have to get your name out and chat with the crowd… but make sure you also throw some fabulous dinner parties – or get invited to them because those are the events that allow you to have a richer conversation. Niche communities are where people will trust each other, participate in deeper conversations about their needs, and really get to know you. Setting up a community to serve the same purpose as a dinner party requires:

  • A appealing location (even if that location is virtual) that encourages conversation and connections
  • Good content that will encourage the conversations you want the group to have
  • A community manager who facilitates introductions, highlights content, and keeps the conversation going
  • Participation of experts and thought leaders that people want to meet – whether from within your own company or external

You can throw the dinner party, which may cost more but you get to decide who gets invited, or you can work on being a sought-after guest – someone that helps hosts provide good content and/or energy. But beware: It is all to easy to provide an appealing location, invite people over and assume they will form a tight knit community. But think about throwing a dinner party, having people come over and then spending the evening in another room – maybe yelling out to them every once in a while. Awkward, no? People would chit chat a little but the conversation would be stilted because there they are, sitting in your living room… waiting for you and the food, eventually leaving in disappointment and annoyance.

Communities are a phenomenal way of developing relationships with prospects and customers… but don’t think they will effortlessly develop. Want to understand them a little better? Go home and plan a dinner party.

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Using Social Networking Sites in B2B Businesses?

Filed under Discussion by Kate Brodock on 8 June 2009 at 11:37 {3 comments}

In the B2B Online Marketing group on LinkedIn, Rob Schmelz, E-Commerce Manager for Central Restaurant Products, asked a simple question from people:

robb2b

The question got a few good responses that hit on several key issues involved in instituting social media into the B2B space.

Kathryn Korostoff, Founder and President of Research Rockstar, notes varied successes:

kathrynb2b

A lot of success to date with B2B and social media use has been in cultivating communication with your current constituents: customers, clients, and employees.  As Kathryn mentioned, they had a ton of success using the tools for their customer support.  Other such examples are internal communities for current employees, or platforms that increase the connection to tier one clients.  She also highlights where social media tactics have room to grow: new client or customer acquisitions, or new sales.  In summary, at least in Kathryn’s experience, social media has been much more useful in making existing relationships stronger and deepter.

Scott Hardigree, CEO of Indiemark, which recently launched the mformer portion of their services to target B2B companies,

scottb2b

There is still a place for quick, viral marketing to happen in the B2B space.  A lot of people think this and other forms of word of mouth marketing are reserved for the B2C space.

Maria Colacurcio, Co-Founder of SmartSheet,

mariab2b

As Kathryn also mentioned, social media is a great way to develop your standing as an expert in your field and, ideally, an industry leader.  One of the primary ways this is done in the B2B space is to have a company blog where you’re able to post valuable information that brings readers back for more, and thus creates more brand awareness for when it does come time to make a decision on a certain product or service.  It’s icing on the cake that also boosts your SEO.

Jann LaGoy Mirchandani, Owner of Mirchandani Consulting, a graphic & web design firm in New York, commented:

jannb2b

Some B2B industries may see more success than others when it comes to sales.  Part of that, as Jann points to, may be a result of having a company with a little bit more word of mouth capabilities.  Once you have happy customers, information on a jewelry design may have the capability to be more “talked about” outside your direct network or industry connections than, say, a supply management software application.

Do you have any thoughts on successes or failures in the B2B space?  What have been our experiences?

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