In most of the visits I do with companies on social, the big question I get asked is what is the benefit of becoming a social business?
Here are a few great benefits that I see:
- Stronger employee engagement. Stronger employee engagement leads to great client engagement. In a social business, employees are smarter, more loyal, and engaged because their organization uses social networks, collaboration systems and shared messaging services.
- Great talent in and around! A “social” approach enables employees around the world to tap into each other’s expertise and connections. Companies can attract top talent and give employees the social tools they need to work together. Executives can layer analytics on top of social technologies to make sure their companies have the right skills and expertise to meet market demands.
- Exceptional client service. A social business is also one where customer service is exceptional because the company reaches out to customers through social networks, Twitter and blogs in innovative ways and acts on the insights it pulls together about consumers. That way, customer service teams have the insights and the analytics they need to predict and resolve problems before they happen.
- Personalized. Value in a Social Business is created not for ‘market segments’ or demographics but for individuals. Companies can dish up more targeted offers to customers and respond more quickly to their problems. R&D can gain new sources of inspirations and insight from customers and employees so that the products customers want are the ones that get to market … customized to their particular need, even made to order!
What are your thoughts on the value you see in Social?
To add to your list. We can bring in the employees to the forefront of a company Branding/Messaging strategy. An excellent example of this is IBM voices. http://www.ibm.com/voices
One of the benefits I have seem of fully connected Social Businesses is the serendipity environment that fosters benefits could not be foreseen at the start of the journey to become a Social Business.
This serendipity only appears once all pillars within the organisation have adopted social media and are integrating with each other, but the benefit are truly new ideas, methods, working practices as well as personal benefits for employees and their careers.
Bit of a hard one to explain at the start of a Social Business program though 🙂
Robert, I have heard this word alot recently. serendipity. It was everywhere at SXSW.
Did you great that or did something influence you on that focus?
I think we are at a very exciting stage in the evolution of Social Business. Connecting communities, providing access to information, and facilitating collaboration are helpful to the individual, but the true value to the business is still difficult to measure. To really drive sustainable and quantifiable value, there needs to a means of aligning those conversations, at scale, to the strategic goals of the enterprise.