My last post argued that social media is now at the end of a period of great disruption and is now entering a longer, quieter period of normalization. I need to emphasize that we are talking about the world’s organizations, and there is a long, long tail.
While some companies such as Dell Computer, SAP and Intuit are at the very beginning of transitioning into normalization, there are some companies who have just started to dabble in social media. For some, it may be too late and they may not make the transition from a successful Broadcast Era company into an even more successful Conversational Era company.
In some parts of the world, and in many large niches, social media has just begun and it is far from normal just yet. Sometimes something happens in the marketplace that accelerates social media. Dell, SAP and Intuit had strategic challenges and social media has helped them accelerate solutions. Although these challenges have not yet been resolved, social media has unarguably played very favorable roles in resolving them.
It seems that to get a large organization fully immersed in social media, they very often need to face problems, problems that are best resolved by interacting to customers, by listening and responding to their problems.
Three companies that have not been overly immersed in social media historically probably felt they did not need it. Apple Computer has long been the world’s favorite tech company. It’s scrappy. It has been an underdog and it’s products have been way cooler than competitive offerings.
But lately, the company has made moves that feel more like schoolyard bully than scrappy underdog. And having its charismatic CEO read and answer cherry-picked emails just may not be enough, as competitive products get closer to even with Apple offerings.
Apple may soon find a need to use social media for more conversations with its constituents.
The same with Toyota, a company that until recently did not need social media in the ways that General Motors and Ford Motors have need it–and successfully used it to rebuild user trust.
Toyota is already active in social media. But it has elected to use advertising, not Twitter, for its main response to user safety concerns.
I think five years from today, both Apple and Toyota will use social media more and traditional marketing less to address customer and market concerns. Either that that or they will find themselves eclipsed by companies they comfortably outpace today.
But what about BP? Could social media help them? Well, there are certain things social cannot do and the apparent combination of callousness and carelessness cannot be fixed by sounding warm and fuzzy on a blog.
But if BP were active in social media, they would at least be able to demonstrate that they are listening to a world united against them in horror and anger. And perhaps they would at least be sensitive enough to get their CEO to skip week end yacht races.
I do believe that we are at a flex point that makes it easier for the likes of Apple, Toyota and BP. Instead of breaking the new that Dell, SAP, Intuit and so many other companies broke, they can simply follow the trail blazed by others and get there faster.
That’s what I meant yesterday when I said good ideas are being replaced by redundant best practices. That’s what happens in normalization periods. These things take time.
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Sue Ann, This was a follow up post. In the previous one, I mentioned IBM and SAP, two of the world’s largest B2B organizations. It also mentioned Intuit, the world’s largest small business-to-business company.
Social media needs to become less about specific platforms and more about a general process of communicating / marketing to potential customers. Until that happens, things won’t be normalized. It’s kind of like when AOL was the most popular email platform … AOL = email, but it took email becoming much more widely accepted before email became a real business tool.
Also, while you mention companies that are succeeding in the B2C space, until companies figure out B2B you won’t be able to call things normalized.
Good, thought-provoking post Shel.
Business…well, all kinds of institutions for that matter, make decisions for all kinds of reasons. Fear, uncertainty, arrogance, empathy, sympathy, follow-the-leader, follow-the-loser, and a host of other factors go in to good and bad decisions and developments.
I think we are in the midst of several worlds co-existing in Social Media. One is the world of those who dove in head-first, embraced tools that are the most revolutionary communication and connection tools we have witnessed in many years, and are continuing to use them to their advantage. Another world is of those who are curious, are dabbling, and are scurrying around experimenting. Another is the world of those who think Social is the devil, and, by golly, they don’t need it to survive, and they’re going to prove that to everyone by holding out!
Many worlds exist in between the three I mentioned. What is important for all to know is that it is no longer our decision, but our clients and potential client’s, decision regarding how they expect to be communicated with, how they want their problems solved, the speed at which they expect an answer and the way they are evolving. It’s time to jump in strategically, to take advantage of the tools, and the gifts, we have been given that allow us to be closer to those who we want to care about our products and services.
Great post Shel. I am in the midst of reading ‘The Facebook Effect’ and was surprised to learn that Apple was an early (and large) customer of Facebook’s as they felt the exposure to the higher ed demographic was the holy grail. Of course, they were a display advertiser, not a participant in the conversation. Soon after, they receded into the social media background for the reasons you mentioned – they probably felt they didn’t need it. Nevertheless, it wasn’t for a lack of being there in the beginning.
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