Social Collaboration & Social CRM Under the Spotlight

July 20, 2011 - PRLog -- Businesses need to drastically change their corporate culture and ways of thinking if they are to get a handle on socialising the enterprise.

That’s according to the results of a recent set of roundtable discussions held by Enterprise Communications on the use of social collaboration and social CRM within the enterprise.

Designed to create awareness of the latest developments within the enterprise communications space, these roundtables drew business leaders together for a day to discuss how firms should be harnessing both social CRM and social collaboration to deliver real business benefits.

Indeed, as Lauren Vargas, Director of Community, Radian6, explains, those embarking on moves to socialise the enterprise both internally and externally face a challenging task that won’t happen overnight.

“In a new world where conversation is immediate, adapting to such change requires change management principles similar to the eight-step change model outlined by John Kotter,” she says.

For Bruno Teuber, Vice President & GM EMEA, Lithium Technologies, the move towards SCRM also marks a profound cultural shift because it acknowledges that customers now also own the brand.

“For many companies, brand building has been synonymous with rigid control over messaging, but in the age of the social customer, this is no longer desirable even if it were possible,” he says.

A key issue for those listening and engaging through social media rests upon how they link resulting media into core CRM systems.

Steve Fearon, VP CRM Solutions, Oracle, explains, “By not evolving their CRM systems in line with their social media activity, organisations are missing the opportunity to evolve their business model, re-define their strategy and ultimately their service offering to up-sell and increase revenue – be it through repeat customers or new customers who’ve been influenced in an on-line forum.”

With social networking sites having completely altered the dynamic and way we interact online there have also been drives to decompartmentalise the enterprise.

As Rob Bamforth, Principal Analyst, Communication, Collaboration and Convergence, Quocirca, notes though, social collaboration works best in areas where a shared pool of information or experiences are most useful.

He says, “One example is customer touch points where different roles, such as sales and customer service, all interact with the customer but have historically been poor at sharing the knowledge of the interaction with fellow colleagues.”

However, as Richard George, PR Manager, LinkedIn, reminds us, social collaboration impacts upon all levels and areas within the enterprise.

“It’s relevant to the CIO looking to embrace new communications platforms to increase efficient flow of information and it’s relevant to the HR department as they adopt social recruiting as a way to identify potential talent through the networks of existing staff,” he adds. “It’s also relevant to the marketing department as they realise the ability for social media as a way of building viral marketing campaigns through recommendations.”

These roundtable events form just one part of the Enterprise Communications portfolio which was created to help end users within the industry learn about the latest communications products and solutions for enterprises. These roundtable discussions also help companies to engage more easily with existing and potential clients, creating awareness for what they do.

To read the day’s roundtable events in full go to: http://www.enterprisecommunications.com/roundtable-discus...

For further information please contact Lisa-Marie Carter on:

Email: lisamarie@lrgamedia.com

http://www.enterprisecommunications.com

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