Social Business -- Farmer's Insurance #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz #ibm
All:
I was invited to Farmer's to present new Leadership Skills in a Social Business world. First, I view this as a insightful move from the executive team. The line up of speakers was impressive and their focus on coaching and 21st century skills was amazing.
As I did 4 sessions to the highest senior team, I think I learned as much as they did but on different things. Here's what I learned from Farmer's.
- Farmer's is commited to leadership 2020. This meeting focused on the leadership skills required to get them there. So many times companies focus on strategy and priorities. They focused on people.
- As I love to say, culture eats strategy for lunch. Their culture is one of authencity and teaming to lead them to that growth. It is impressive.
- While growth is top of mind, the thing that impressed me the most, was their focus on "not at any cost". They reminded me about the mission of "caring for people" and how that has impacted their company. They care for people -- their employees, agents, and clients. This oozes from everything they did.
I often say that becoming a Social Business will amplify your culture and values. I was very impressed with Farmer's Insurance as a company, and its leadership team and have no doubt that Farmer's Journey will be successful.
Social Business: Germany Social? ! #jamcamp #ibmsocialbiz #socbiz
Being just in Germany, I had read that Germany was not yet ready for Social Business. But studying the facts, and seeing the number of German companies already adoption social at great rates, like Bayer, Sennheiser, and more I think that Germany maybe behind in Social adoption for personal reasons but not in business. A recent report for Dell from Trendstream showed that 70% of German businesses are using social media for business purposes and 40% for customer acquisition
In the chart below from the Global Web Index, we see that Germany is the second country in its use of Social to research products and find new products to buy.
What are your thoughts on Germany and Social? What about your country?
Social Business #JamCamp
I just got back from Germany at the Social Business JamCamp! First, the team and people are pictured below who came up with this creative idea to deepen client relationships!
The Tour began with the Bus Tour!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4hQuWh6mUQ]
Then ended with a 2 day session on Social Business -- one day focused on Internal Social Business, and one session focused on External Social Business!
Even though reports show slower pick up of Social for personal reasons, we see Germany as a best practice adoption region for Social Business overall.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V4io8m75pc]
Social Business and Bayer! #ibmsocialbiz #ls12 #socbiz #ibm
I was just in Germany at the #JamCamp! I met up with one of the earliest adopters of Social -- Bayer!
I wanted to share their storyas told to the audience by Kurt De Ruwe, the visionary CIO who began this social collaboration revolution inside the company. (See Kurt and I below after our lunch together discussing next steps!)
With over 111k employees, Kurt and team had several challenges. They had several teams working on the same problem across the world with duplication of effort and no real sharing of the solutions. With an aging population, Kurt had 35% of the people with thorough process and tool knowledge that were going to retire in the next 7 to 10 years.
So he set out to help Bayer become more competitive. With a primary Social question in mind, he drove to create a culture where sharing is seen as normal and to stimulate the innovation process.
He piloted a set of communities in R&D (for innovation) and O&I (for social knowledge management of best practices). His progress and viral usage was amazing.
The pilot he started in the Materials Areas is now set to be ssed throughout his company. The R&D team focused on innovation, communities to spark the spirit of the team, and to facilitate crowdsourcing of ideas. For O&I, he wisely worked on setting up places of sharing, communities to drive better practices, and to reach the teams at all levels.
The success of his innovation stimulation and best practice sharing was built on a set of simple principles:
Social Business Coffee Break! Thank God its Monday! Social Enabling your Sales Team! #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz
Team:
Thanks for the overwhelming notes and comments on the Coffee Breaks ! I am so happy they are adding value and helping you in your company.
Please send me other topics that you'd like to see!
This week's Social Business Coffee Break is about Social Enablement for Sales. It is an IBM example of our use social enablement!
Enjoy!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJNSKZH_Juw]
Social Business: Quick 3 trends I noticed in the UK #ibmsocialbiz #ibm #socbiz
I was in London all day on Friday and discovered some great trends here in UK!
- Only 55% of UK businesses build online communities and 21% of those who do have a Social Community, depend on IT to drive it. Those who leverage Social Communities are having great success but typically it is a joint IT/Business driven venture. I would encourage your focus to remain on the IT / Business partnership.
- Channel management came up consistently in the UK. Discussions on approach are crucial: for instance, you could target 100 new facebook fans a week, 20 online discussions on forums, etc. OR UK companies are reviewing the Tipper view: get 5 influential bloggers to talk about your product or company and then have them reach the masses. This is a very sophisticated approach to the thought process.
- Investment discussions were around Training of employees and Social listening. Again, 2 of the key areas to drive results. Very good direction from the UKI clients.
I didn't have any UK companies provide me with permission yet to tell their stories -- but soon!
Social Business Case Studies! Dutch Government Agency! #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz
While I was at the Leadership Alliance event, I met with a Dutch Govternment Agency.
Dutch social networking usage has grown more than 70 percent since last year, and the Netherlands ranks first worldwide in Twitter and LinkedIn market penetration, according to a new social media survey. comScore Inc. (Reston, VA), a digital measurement and research firm, recently released the study, which showed that while Dutch social networking site Hyves continues to be the most popular social media venue in the Netherlands, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are extending their reach in the Dutch marketplace.
This Dutch Government Agency has deployed IBM Connections -- a social networking tool - like Facebook and Twitter on Steroids for internal use. So far they have over 5300 people leveraging the community in 2 weeks with over 200 communities. The communities are around areas of interest like IT Support, Digital Workplace, and Emergency Response communities. So far over 30K connections have been made and the team I met with , said the culture has already started a change based on the ability to share information so quickly!
We are hoping for more on this great story at our 2012 Social Business Forum in January in Orlando!
CMO Study Reveals Social is a Struggle for Some #CMOs #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz #ibm
Our IBM CMO study found that while 82 percent of CMOs say they plan to increase their use of social media over the next three to five years, only 26 percent are currently tracking blogs, 42 percent are tracking third party reviews and 48 percent are tracking consumer reviews to help shape their marketing strategies
Marketers who underestimate the impact of social media are like those who were slow to view the Internet as a new and powerful platform for commerce. Like the rise of e-business more than a decade ago, the radical embrace of social media by all customer demographic categories represents an opportunity for marketers to drive increased revenue, brand value and to reinvent the nature of the relationship between enterprises and the buyers of their offerings. Marketers who establish a culture receptive to deriving insight from social media will be far better prepared to anticipate future shifts in markets and technology.
While they identify customer intimacy as a top priority, and recognize the impact of real-time data supplementing traditional methods of channel marketing and gathering market feedback, most CMOs say they remain mired in 20th century approaches. Eighty-percent or more of the CMOs surveyed are still focusing primarily on traditional sources of information such as market research and competitive benchmarking, and 68 percent rely on sales campaign analysis to make strategic decisions.
Social Business Agenda and Get Bold in Forbes!
All: I was very humbled and honored by this great article in Forbes on IBM's award winning approach to Social Business.
I'd like to share it here! Click this one!
Social Business Coffee Break! Know your Tippers, Opinion Leaders #socbiz #ibmsocialbiz #ibm
It's Thank God its Monday cause we have our next Social Business Coffee Break!
This one is one of my favorites. It links to Social Analytics that we had discussed as well as gaining trust in the marketplace.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6ShR3bOE-M]