Wrong-headed Hoopla About Social ROI

Too many social media pundits hold the view that a social Return on Investment (ROI) can’t be determined. You’ll hear all kinds of reasons like too many unknowns. And there’s my personal favorite, “Don’t worry about the ROI, just get a strategy and start doing something.”

Well, I agree with part of the above statement. You do a need a social strategy to before you can even begin to determine the social ROI (smROI). But the rest? They’re mythtaken.

Social ROI can be determined. So why do the myths around ROI persist? Here are a few reasons:

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Objectives & Strategy–Social Business Starting Points

There’s so much talk about social ROI but the focus seems to be on the endpoint (ROI). As important as determining the ROI can be, it’s the caboose on the business case train.

The starting point is objectives, followed by strategy design, KPI definition, and then lastly, the determination of the ROI. Let's talk turkey.

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Focus Roundtable – Becoming a social business

If you missed The Business of Social Business live talk on Focus, catch it on replay. This was the first of several sessions where Dr. Natalie and I discussed the 7 steps to become a social business.

This week, we covered the first 3 steps: 

  1. Understand the impact on traditional functional roles.
  2. Understand the impact on the business at large - people, process, & technology.
  3. Listen & discover with social monitoring.

Next week, Dr. Natalie and I will continue the discussion, focusing on social objectives and strategy.

Both of these sessions are based on content from our The Business of Social Business ebook.

RIM (Blackberry) = Social Business #Fail

OMG. Have you been following the RIM (Blackberry) outage snafu in the UK? This is an operational crisis accentunated by a communication crisis. And it's an anti-case study in how to be a failed social business that lacks customer centricity.

Update - Oct 12 - The crisis moved into the 3rd consecutive day so I updated my video analysis. Here it is...

Dr. Natalie and I are talking about The Business of Social Business in tomorrow's Focus Roundtable. We'll be providing important insight this week and next in how to avoid being a RIM. Because trust me, you don't want to lose customers the way they're going to.

 

Reference articles

BlackBerry Service Crashes in Europe

BlackBerry Outage Persists in U.S.; Customers Rely on Work-Arounds

Outages Plague RIM's BlackBerry for Second Day in Europe, India

Social Media Woes Highlight Marketing Faults

 

This article isn't specifically about the RIM outage, but you may find it an interesting perspective about RIM's future...

A third of BlackBerry's enterprise base to head for exits in 2012

 

Social Business Impacts People, Process, & Technology

If you want to build a successful social business, then you need to understand how it will impact your company. For example, you need to understand there’s a difference between activities like launching miscellaneous marketing campaigns using social media channels and implementing corporate-wide initiatives.

The latter situation is a change management issue – and that means it will impact people, processes, and technology

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4 Ways Rackspace Email Inspires High Customer Satisfaction

Rackspace Email is the example of a customer-centric companies all others should aspire to. Here's why...

Catch the replay of yesterday's Focus roundtable on Customer Centricity in a Social CRM World, co-hosted with Dr. Natalie and including our guest Emily Yellin.

 

How California Tortilla Exemplifies Customer Centricity

In last week’s Focus Roundtable on The Promise of Social CRM, Dr. Natalie and I talked about how Social CRM is emulating the human approach. Kelly asked the question “What is the antithesis of a human approach? Example?”

In answer to Kelly’s question, I said look at most companies call centers. Putting the snark aside, though, there are companies that are getting Social CRM and doing it right.

California Tortilla is one company and I'm going to tell you why.

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