SVAMA's “Social Media Trends for 2010” with Jeremiah Owyang & panelists

Last night Jeremiah Owyang and panelists: Rob Fuggetta (Zuberance), Ed Terpening, (Wells Fargo), Maria Poveromo (Adobe) and Jeanette Gibson (Cisco) held a great discussion on “Social Media Trends for 2010.”  Owyang cited that one of the major challenges companies and organizations face is speed: the market is running much faster than companies can move.  So what does this mean for anyone devising social media strategy? 

Owyang and the crew focused on four themes

1. Don’t fondle the hammer – In terms of culture, process and technology, remember that technology is the easy part.  Don’t get caught up in the tools.

Forget the “facebook strategy” focus on a clear customer strategy.

A clear understanding of socialgraphics should be an ongoing effort: 

o   Where are your customers online (have a list of urls)?

o   What are their social behaviors?

o   Where do they get trusted information?

o   What is your customer social influence?  Who trusts them?

o   How do your customers use social technologies in the context of your products?

Focus on building the house not fondling the hammer!

Action: understand your customers & focus on objectives

     2.     Live the 80% rule & make sure your organization is ready for the shift.

Social media implementation is 80% process and labor, and only 20% technology.

Typical roles you’ll need in your organization to make it happen: 

Social Strategist – responsible for the overall program, including ROI

Community Manager – customer facing role; trusted by customers

Action: Prepare your organization to scale and support the 80%

 

3.     Customers don’t care about what department you’re in, they just want their problem fixed!

Every customer touch point matters – so your organization (the front line at a minimum) needs to have the information and permission to support and respond to the public.

Action:  Distribute the support network; enable people across the organization to be a part; central strategy but decentralized action is a good first step (some organizations start with a central model but move to distributed/coordinated model over time).  Empower folks on the front line.

 4.     Real time is “not” fast enough.

You will never be able to scale fast enough to keep up with your customers.  Creating and maintaining a solid customer advocacy program is crucial.  Let your customers come to bat for you because you cannot go at it alone.

Action: Identify and nurture advocates in your community.

Bottom line sentiment was that the direction of social media in 2010 is “getting back to basics”  --  it’s all about customers and relationships, technology is the enabler.