Logic+Emotion

Holidays

Ended the year with a flurry of activity. We went public with our newly elevated offering around social business—have delivered significant milestones with several clients and wrapped up my frequent air travel for the year. The next couple of weeks will be spent catching up with family, friends and even some snowboarding. Here's to you and yours in 2012.

Demystifying Social Business

Originally published on Edelman Digital

If you Google the phrase “social business” you’ll get a variety of results returned. One of the first and perhaps oldest is a Wikipedia entry, which describes “social business” as “a non-loss, non-dividend company designed to address a social objective within the highly regulated marketplace of today.”

The Wikipedia entry states the following: This article is about a business with a social objective. For organization designed around social tools, social media, and social networks, see Social media. The number one position (at least on my search) serves up a web page from IBM, which describes social business by saying, “People don’t do business with companies. People do business with people. Here is why―and how—to become a Social Business.”

While both are correct, the definition that IBM outlines not just the idea, the theory of social business, but the practical application that we are seeing in the industry today.  What Yunus envisioned, IBM has put a structure and focus around and broadened to include doing business in a connected age. In light of this, here are a few considerations for how “social business” might break down for you and why it’s related to social media, but not the same.

1. Social Brand + Social Enterprise = Social Business

Remember this simple formula. A social brand is what your customer feels (perhaps being engaged on social platforms as part of the customer experience), while a social enterprise internalizes social as part of the way employees collaborate and how the business interacts with partners. The two, add up to doing business in a social and connected way. It means being plugged in from the start and incorporating feedback loops. In this regard, many businesses that run forums where they listen and engage with their most active customers already understand the foundation of social business.

2. Believe In Life After Likes

Social business is bigger than Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and (insert social network here) combined. It’s about applying a social layer across the entire organization—connecting a company to all of its stakeholders (customers, employees, business partners, shareholders, etc). What we’ve seen in the past few years was an explosion of social across mostly marketing and communications departments, but what’s coming in the next several years is social integration at the enterprise level. A great starting point to assess if your company is moving in the right direction is to count the heads of the people working on social integration initiatives full time. If you don’t get past counting to one, you’re in trouble.

3. Think Beyond Media

There are opportunities to leverage social media as a new way to spread a message, be heard, tell a story or get a story amplified. The media industry has, notably, been disrupted by social media as blogs and real-time communications have gained traction among audiences and eaten away at attention newspapers, radio and television news properties once exclusively served. In response, media companies were forced to integrate social media into their operations, empowering journalists early on to create their own blogs, and over time to become deeply integrated into social networking platforms.  This was not a mere media tactic, but a shift in how media companies functioned and conducted business.  Born out of necessity or not, the media industry showed how to become a more social business.

4. Get Social By Design

Social media projects are typically constructed of experiments, skunk works and unsanctioned projects, which launch and take shape before most people across a company even realize they are happening. Some of these experiments are successful; many are not—but organizations find out after the fact that there is something powerful happening within their audience. Social business benefits from a more thoughtful and disciplined approach.  Social business requires planning—taking stock of every social-digital embassy, property and initiative (both internal and external) and assessing what should stay, what needs formal investments and what goes to the chopping block. The entire business strategy for an organization must be considered through this lens of social business. This “design” process—an intentional and purposeful approach—allows for social media, and truly social thinking, to be integrated and scaled.

5. Learn To Become A Matchmaker

Nobody owns “social business” — – but everyone feels its influence.  Social business planning must be championed by leadership, built into the efforts to flatten management structures and bridge the gaps between organizational silos. The CMO and CIO must join forces, and invite the heads of HR, R&D and customer service to be a part of the same conversation. Social business change agents must also become matchmakers, because getting a video to go viral will seem easy in comparison to getting people in different departments to come together around social.

Remember that Google search result I mentioned a few paragraphs back?  The number three result for social business links to an article from Fast Company titled “Move Over Social Media, Here Comes Social Business”. Its prime search rank is proof that social extends beyond marketing and media.  When Microsoft decided to open their SDK (Software Developer Kit) for Kinect to developer communities, they made a calculated decision that value would flow back to the company as it simultaneously benefits developers. Even organizations such as NASA have reaped rewards from the decision to be a social business. This is a sign that in being a social or connected business—the end goal is value for multiple stakeholders, and for both business (and society) that’s a good thing.

*Microsoft is an Edelman client

Six Social Media Trends for 2012

Originally posted on Harvard Business Review

Each year at this time, I look forward and predict trends in social media for the coming year. But first, I look back at my predictions from last year. How'd I do? Not bad.

Social media continues to move forward toward business integration, a trend that I identified last year. In a joint study from Booz & Company and social platform developer Buddy Media, 57 percent of businesses surveyed plan to increase social media spending, while 38 percent of CEO's label social as a high priority.

I was also partially accurate in predicting that Google would "strike back" in 2011. They did, with Google Plus, a formidable initiative that acts as Google's "social layer" to the Web. Part social network and part social search, Google Plus has industry observers scratching their heads, wondering if Facebook will be given a run for their money or if the service evolves into something complimentary in a highly social Web.

I had one big swing-and-miss on Facebook's intrusion in the location-based services war. While Facebook still supports location tracking in a number of ways, it has not put Foursquare out of business. Foursquare still enjoys a niche audience of highly active participants who enjoy telling the world where they are and post pictures to prove it. It is however worth noting that Facebook recently acquired location based network Gowalla, so continue to watch this space.

So what can we expect in 2012 in a world that seems to grow ever connected by the hour? Here are six predictions to ponder, in no particular order:

Convergence Emergence. For a glimpse into how social will further integrate with "real life," we can look at what Coca Cola experimented with all the way back in 2010. Coke created an amusement park where participants could "swipe" their RFID-equipped wristbands at kiosks, which posted to their Facebook account what they were doing and where. Also, as part of a marketing campaign, Domino's Pizza posted feedback — unfiltered feedback — on a large billboard in Times Square, bringing together real opinions from real people pulled from a digital source and displayed in the real world. These types of "trans-media" experiences are likely to define "social" in the year to come.

The Cult of Influence. In much the same way that Google has defined a system that rewards those who produce findable content, there is a race on to develop a system that will reward those who wield the most social influence. One particular player has emerged, Klout, determined to establish their platform as the authority of digital influence. Klout's attempt to convert digital influence into business value underscores a much bigger movement which we'll continue to see play out in the next year. To some degree everyone now has some digital influence (not just celebrities, academics, policy makers or those who sway public opinion). But for the next year, the cult of influence becomes less about consumer plays like Klout and more about the tools and techniques professionals use to "score" digital influence and actually harness, scale and measure the results of it.

Gamification Nation. No we're not taking about video games. Rather, game-like qualities are emerging within a number of social apps in your browser or mobile device. From levels, to leaderboards, to badges or points, rewards for participation abound. It's likely that the trend will have to evolve given how competition for our time and attention this gaming creates. Primarily, gamification has been used in consumer settings, but look for it in other areas from HR, to government, healthcare and even business management. Perhaps negotiating your next raise will be tied to your position on the company's digital leaderboard.

Social Sharing. Ideas, opinions, media, status updates are all part of what makes social media a powerful and often disruptive force. The media industry was one of the first to understand this, adding sharing options to content, which led to more page views and better status in search results. What comes next in social sharing is more closely aligned with e-commerce or web transactions. For example, Sears allows a user to share a product or review with their networks directly from the site. Sharing that vacation you just booked, or recommending a product, or service from any site to a social network is where sharing goes next. We probably don't know what we are willing to share until we see the option to do it.

Social Television. For many of us, watching television is already a social act, whether it's talking to the person next to you, or texting, tweeting, and calling friends about what you're watching. But television is about to become a social experience in a bigger and broader sense. The X Factor now allows voting via Twitter and highlights other social promotions, which encourages viewers to tap social networks while they watch. Another way media consumption is becoming social comes from a network called Get Glue which acts as something of a Foursquare for media. Participants can "check-in" to their favorite shows (or other forms of media) and collect stickers to tell the world what programs they love. Watch for more of this this year as ratings rise for socially integrated shows.

The Micro Economy. Lastly as we roll into 2012, watch for a more social approach to solving business problems through a sort of micro-economy. Kickstarter gives anyone with a project, the opportunity to get that initiative funded by those who choose to (and patrons receive something in return). A crowdsourcing platform for would be inventors called Quirky lets the best product ideas rise to the top and then helps them get produced and sold while the "inventor" takes a cut. Air BnB turns homes into hotels and travelers into guests, providing both parties with an opportunity to make and save money. These examples may point to a new future reality where economic value is directly negotiated and exchanged between individuals over institutions.

These are a few emerging trends which come to mind. As with anything, looking to the past often gives us clues for what may come in the future. Please weigh in with your thoughts: where do you see "social" going in 2012?

Social Business Planning in 2012

Originally posted on Edelman Digital

Today marks my two-year anniversary at Edelman, or what we affectionately like to refer to as an “Edelversary”. So much has changed in the industry since joining the team here—we are truly working in a real-time business environment. We’ve seen “social” move from an item to be checked off the list from major brands to something they are genuinely grappling with in terms of integrating at scale across the enterprise. At Edelman Digital, we’ve always approached social a bit differently from others—focusing on the fact that much if it revolves around human-to-human interactions (we now call this community management), but if social is to scale—it must begin to spill out of the marketing silo and truly influence how we do business. We believe a connected business is better positioned for the future than a business, which remains disconnected and non adaptive.

Today, we’re announcing a partnership with Edelman Consulting led by Mike Kuczowski, in which we are actively elevating our services around social business to meet what we believe will be the opportunity in the years to come. In order for a business to truly extract value from social initiatives, we must consider not only marketing but how it impacts research and development, human resources, innovation, business intelligence and other facets of an organization which help drive a business forward. Michael’s team has deep experience solving complex business challenges while our digital team possesses incredible savvy and a global perspective for how social-digital operates at scale (folks like Michael Brito, Zena Weist, Robin Hamman, Dave Fleet, & Chuck Hemann to name a few).

Social Business Planning

View more presentations from Edelman Insights

Together, we’re looking forward to elevating the game for companies who truly wish to push their social initiatives beyond acquiring fans and followers. As an initial gesture, we are openly putting our approach out on the social web, which outlines not only our joint philosophy on social business planning but also, the methodology we use when working with clients. We believe that over the next ten years, most businesses will move past the ROI question of social—and get to work on doing business in a connected age. This will require gradual if not steady change and a commitment to evolving business practices.  We’re looking forward to partnering with likeminded organizations and individuals who see the world in a similar fashion.

You can read more information on this initiative here.  We’re excited to play our part in moving the discussion of social business from philosophy to action.

Forrester's "Three Social Thunderstorms" At LeWeb

I didn't attend LeWeb this year, but judging by the chatter, one of the more discussed talks was given by Forrester's CEO, George Colony who outlined three "thunderstorms" approaching the tech & business world. I just finished watching his talk, and thought it would be interesting to outline portions of his talk with my take layered on it:

Thunderstorm 1:  The Death of The Web
You'll have to watch the video (above) to grasp the full intricacies of what George is putting forth, but essentially he's making a call that app economies which have the potential to tap both processing power and the cloud, will change the Web and move it away from a network/browser model to something which leverages devices, apps and the cloud in a more powerful way.

My Take: Scale & Sustainability vs. Experience
I get what George is saying and claiming the death of anything gets headlines, but really what this will likely come down to is user experience vs. sustainability and scale. Apps already show promise of providing better experiences than browser/network, but a question remains how scalable it is for enterprises vs. consumers. While HTML 5 is already working on a more stable browser experience, apps are often dependent on OS systems. What's more probable is that the Web as we know it doesn't die—but loses dominance in the consumer area specifically. For businesses specifically, the demand will be formed around what model scales and can be sustained globally over time. 

Thunderstorm 2:  Social Saturation
Social is running out of hours and people meaning there is finite demand to meet the current glut of social start-ups and networks competing for our attention, usage and loyalty. As a result, we are moving into a "post social" world in which we see the demise of platforms like Foursquare which don't offer enough value to survive. The post social web will see new or evolved players who offer efficiency and value.

My Take: Value Is In The Eye of The Beholder
I think George is right on the bubble assessment but claiming that social platforms will move away from the Foursquare's of the world to platforms which offer concrete effiiencies and value is debatable. Both Twitter and Facebook emerged and evolved as different tools from which they started. Essentially the free market will demand what happens here, but it is likely that the ones who succeed will look more like a Kickstarter over yet another photo/location sharing network.

Thunderstorm 3: The Enterprise
George cited that 72 percent of enterprises are either interested in or already implementing social technologies as part of how their business operates. He cited a number of players in the enterprise space such as Salesforce, IBM and Microsoft and hinted that these could evolve and new players could emerge as well. He also noted that one of the core reasons enterprises are interested in social has a lot to do with their customers (the primary focus of enterprise social as he puts it).

My Take: Social Business
George isn't just talking about the internal social enterprise, he's talking about extracting business value from social, like more efficient employees, better business decisions made from data and data analysis, and improved products and services informed by customers to give a few examples. Most organizations are in their infancy of figuring out how to get real value from a newly connected environment and I agree that it's going to take a changing of the guard over time but there are massive opportunities. He's essentially describing social business, which over the next 10 years will need to be executed upon.

Great talk overall, highly recommend viewing it.