Page 134 - Social Media Marketing

Social CRM sits at the core of this cycle—see for example the work of Esteban
Kolsky. It is repeated innovation—not one-off hits—that drives success. The Apple
iPod is a great example. The first models launched in the early 2000s bear only passing
resemblance to the wide range of devices comprising the iPod family and to the ultra-
sleek, button-free iPod Video models available in the market now. The iPod’s market-
share stands at around 75 percent: What other proof of the value of innovation does
one need?

ABSTRACT

Ideation Collaboration
Customer Support Design Development

LEARN DO
112 Active Listening Implementation
c h a p t e r 5 : ╇ S ocial T echnology and B usiness D ecisions╇ ■
Measurement

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HERE! OFFER

Figure€5.1╇â•I‰nnovation and Social Engagement

The connection between innovation and social engagement is directly applicable
to social business and its attendant processes, including Social CRM. This relationship
spans the stages of learning, applying the ideas gained to design, and then iterating to
steadily improve (sometimes in radical steps) what is offered to customers or cause-
related constituents in the marketplace. This is what makes Social CRM different from
traditional sales-cycle-oriented CRM: It’s the addition of customer-powered collabora-
tive participation that powers Social CRM and the realization of a social business.
Without collaborative processes, Social CRM quickly devolves to a more standard
company-driven marketing and business development effort.

It is important to understand the requirement for collaboration in creating a
social business: Otherwise, it’s easy to fall into the trap of “this (Social CRM) is the
same as what we’ve been doing…only now our customers are a formal part of it.”
The problem with this kind of thinking is not that there aren’t analogies to existing
processes—there are, just as there would be in any business process evolution. Rather,
it’s because the “same as...” is exactly the excuse used to avoid substantive change
inside your firm or organization, an excuse that inertial forces within will desperately
seek. Does this sound like an overstatement? It’s not. As with any other aspect of busi-
ness transformation, moving toward a social business mindset involves fundamental