"Much of the discussion about the best use of social media focuses on the importance of listening--monitoring customer online chatter and letting customers give feedback by phone or e-mail. That's certainly a good place to start. But listening is only the beginning of a genuine partnership that the most effective use of social media creates between a company and its customers."

"What defines these leading firms? They treat customer data as a strategic asset, put the customer at the center of all decision making and use data-driven insight to tailor all customer communications. It sounds simple, but can you name five companies that do it? Our research shows that fewer than 15% of firms have a strategic customer-intelligence operation. These firms leverage customer intelligence broadly throughout the organization, they value customer knowledge as a corporate asset and they frequently have an evangelist in the C-suite. They continually demonstrate that customer intelligence drives overall business growth. "

Apart from Natural Born Clickers, this is a massive audience that cannot be tapped.

I am fresh off sabbatical and back in the trenches implementing 2.0 technologies within our enterprise. This year has been crazy busy. It was our big year of deploying the first phases of our multi-phased approach. So how did we do? Well….good news is that I don't think I will get coal in my Christmas stocking, however, I am only sitting on ½ leg of a three legged stool. We have done a ton of work, but we still have a long way to go. As I laid out in Intel's Enterprise Social Computing Strategy Revealed, Intel has been dabbling internally with web 2.0 since 2004. We made a concerted decision to take the momentum and learning from the grass root efforts, and drive a globally deployed framework for social computing inside Intel. It is no small task. Not only do we have to evaluate and deploy solutions, but we also have to address Governance, Security Concerns, provide quantifiable ROI, capture use cases, and tackle transition change management one person and one team at a time. Here are my reflections on 2009:

"'Socialytic' sounds buzzworthy, for sure. But in 2010, IDC says the combination of business, social and collaborative apps will transform the enterprise software market and alter ERP and BI vendors' products."

"Why do some social sites thrive while others fail? Why do you find some networks have you dedicating hours every day to participate, while others couldn't get you to raise an eyebrow? And why don't your friends see with you eye to eye on what the best services are, even after you've told them about your favorites time and again? The more I am exposed to new sites and social services, it becomes clear to me that there are three core elements that need to be solved to deliver a killer social service - and falling short in just one can mean rapid closure. Meanwhile, even if all three of these core elements are solved for one person doesn't mean they are solved for everyone. These three core elements? Technology, community and relevancy. (Though not always in that order)"

"Engagement is such a grand concept that relates to everything from purchasing and repeat usage to satisfaction and recommendation behavior. Customer intelligence professionals want to nail it down and measure their customers' level of engagement, but they have trouble nailing down a precise model to do so. We have a new case study that details how one organization, Channel 4, the UK media outlet, decoded engagement."

"Social Networks are among the most powerful examples of socialized media. They create a dynamic ecosystem that incubates and nurtures relationships between people and the content they create and share. As these communities permeate and reshape our lifestyle and how we communicate with one another, we're involuntarily forcing advertisers and marketers to rapidly evolve how they vie for our attention. Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Yelp, and other online communities transformed the regimen and practice of marketing "at" people into an opportunity to engage and interact with us - on our terms. It is the zeitgeist of socialized media and it's manifesting into an obsession for branding, advertising, "viral," marketing, and communications experts and professionals worldwide."

Understanding Users of Social Networks

Social media is helping to forge a new era in business transparency and engagement, creating both new challenges and opportunities. Gone are the days when companies could rely on carefully crafted press releases or flashy ad campaigns to communicate with their customers, often in an attempt to convince people that their products are the best in the field. In the age of social media, the rules have changed radically, and people today demand a more honest and direct relationship with the companies with which they do business.

Every week, I probably get a dozen cold calls from companies that have a Sales mindset and our looking to tap into the bank account of our brands. Few of these brands get in the door. But contrast that with the rare company that has the Business Development mindset of an "Exchange of Value." These folks realize that Business Development is about forming relationships that evolve into longer lasting partnerships. In other words, they follow Chris's advice of: * Asking what problem are you solving for your partner. * Selling benefits, not features. * Realize it "Should be as much about their needs as your offering." If you want to get a Brand Manager's attention, I could not recommend more strongly that you act with a Business Development mindset instead of a Sales mindset. Your chances of getting a meeting - and eventually business - increase exponentially when you act that way.

Again and again the results have shown that people are unlikely to identify the best candidate, make the best investment or spot who really committed the crime. When asked to make a group decision, instead of sharing vital information known only to themselves, people tend to repeat information that everyone already knows.

Competing on analytics sounds like a good thing, but is your organization actually living it? This past week at the OMMA Metrics and Measurement conference in San Francisco, we heard several agencies talk about how analytics aren't just a piece of the business, but are the key drivers in helping their clients kick the s#$t out of their competitors. Knowing how to successfully arbitrage and optimize the trigger points of the entire funnel through the use of technology and ingenuity takes not just smart minds but incredible discipline and stamina.

A while back I blogged about the possibility of networks and blogospheres cutting into the need for communities. I believe this is happening a great deal, as now people may have a more purposeful or ideal way of achieving their needs that they were once achieving by being in a community. NOTE: I want to stress in this post I'm referring to *pure* CoPs, ie. cross-functional group spaces to learn about a topic (*usually* comprised of people across different teams). I'm not refering to teams using CoP-like social software, like Basecamp as a group space to coordinate and communicate tasks/project.

Nancy White and Tony Karrer have teamed up to create a brilliant blog aggregation site called, Communities and Networks Connection. This is not a community (it's not a group space where we have an agenda)…and it's not a network as the sources or readers don't connect with others or have their own view of the network. Rather, it's a simple aggregation of blogs on the topics of communities and networks. Basically, it's a convenient one stop shop daily read on what a bunch of bloggers are saying about Communities and Networks.

Three Principles Of Modern Events To be successful, virtual -and real world- event planners must abide by the following principles: 1. Events should integrate with existing communities and social networks where they exist. 2. Events should have a strategy that includes the before and after -not just during. 3. The audience can assert control over the event, so encourage audience participation and know when to get out of the way.