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Using social media for business success

October 8th, 2008 Posted in Blog, Business, Communications, Community, Marketing, Online, Social media, Web

Skeptics take note. Evangelists rejoice! Everyone else might want to pay a little bit more attention. Online social media CAN contribute to business success in different ways. At least, that’s according to Beeline Labs, which recently released the findings of its first of its kind study showing the positive and potential impact of online communities. The 2008 Tribalization of Business study was produced with Deloitte and the Society for New Communications Research It features data, insights, lessons learned and best practices from 140 small and large companies as well as nonprofits on how they’re managing communities, measuring success, and deriving business benefits. A few of the major findings that you might find interesting:

•Online communities can increase revenue, product introduction success ratios and effectiveness while decreasing costs.
•If done properly, communities will transform the way marketing works (reduced costs, improved effectiveness, new opportunities) Hey, who doesn’t want to do that?
•Of course to make this happen organizations need new management thinking and a willingness to invest the time and people to be active and successful online. Just “build it and they will come” doesn’t work.

I’d also add a couple of thoughts:
•Be willing to experiment and fail. sometimes you learn the most from the things that don’t work
•It doesn’t have to be perfect; authentic, thought-provoking and appropriately targeted to your particular market segment go a long way in building relationships and credibility

What’s your experience? Let us know. You can register to get the full data highlights at Beeline Labs or hit our Contact page above.