From social brand to social business

Many organizations today spend a lot of time, resources and financial investment trying to understand the social landscape and engaging their external customers and prospects. They are on a quest to become a social brand. They are investing in Facebook applications, branded communities and blogs; and many are using online monitoring solutions to listen and see what people are saying about the brand. And, from this perspective, many companies today are doing a decent job.

Friends, fans and followers are important, yes. And brands increase their social equity by engaging in two-way dialogue with their constituency, yes. And transparency is key to these external engagements, yes. And while many organizations are trying desperately to humanize their brand, they are failing to understand that they need to humanize their business first.

And thereby lies the business challenge for many organizations today. Years ago with the expansion of Facebook, Twitter and other social networks; and as the influence of the social customer became apparent to everyone, companies of began to “join the conversation”. It was not only an expectation from customers that companies engaged with them but also from social influencers who enjoyed playing Monday morning quarterback and often criticized brands for every customer action/inaction.

And companies listened. In response to the social customer and the growing criticism from the masses, organizations today are now aggressively hiring community managers and social strategists, allocating budgets to social media, hiring social media agencies, integrating social media into other areas of paid media and doing their best at community engagement. They are doing everything a “good” social brand should be doing.

But a good social brand causes problems behind the firewall.

From the outside looking in, most wouldn’t recognize and understand the challenges that social media has created: The anarchy, conflict, confusion of roles and responsibilities, lack of communication and collaboration; and organizational silos that exist behind the firewall is not visible. These challenges make the process of becoming an effective social brand much more difficult and less effective. So for many organizations, this quest to becoming a social brand and a social business is one of a simultaneous effort.

Social business is an organization’s natural (sometimes forced) evolution to humanize its business operations It deals with the internal transformation of an organization and addresses key factors such as change management, organizational models, culture, internal communications, collaboration, governance, training, employee activation, global and technology expansion, team dynamics and the establishment of a measurement philosophy.

In order for companies to do this effectively, they will have to get smarter, acquire new technologies, intelligence, talent and become more open and transparent. The will have to actually communicate with each other, share knowledge, tear down silos and essentially change the way they work day to day. They will have to establish processes and governance models that protect the organization yet empower their employees. They have to change the way they do business, from the way they develop new products to the way they write a press release, and that starts with the people of the organization.

A social business is built upon three pillars – people, process and technology. All three need to work independent of each other, yet need to be completely integrated into the DNA of organizational culture.

The foundation of a fully collaborative social business, whether for a small or large firm is the company’s most valuable asset—its people. It addresses the need to drive organizational change in an effort to shift employee behavior, communicate more effectively across job functions and geographies and tear down organizational silos. All the technology, collaboration software and community applications deployed behind the firewall will not be effective unless there is a fundamental shift in the way employees think, interact with one another and communicate.

These change-management initiatives have to be driven by organizational leadership and practiced at every level in the organization from senior leadership all the way down to a customer support agent. Otherwise, change will not occur. This means that executives must not only talk about changing the organization but exemplify the behaviors that really do facilitate and practice change.

The end result is an increase in trust among all employees at every level; trust of employees and empowering them to engage externally; an increase in budget investments to social business initiatives, collaboration and more effective social organization models.

Process cuts right through the entire fabric of the organization. It ensures that every job function in every business unit and within every geography is consistent when performing certain tasks. For example, when a new employee joins a company and wants to start blogging or Tweeting on behalf of the company, a process should be in place that governs training, certification and social media policies.

Processes should help facilitate the chaos that exists from behind the firewall – i.e. employees sharing sensitive material externally, social media ownership, crisis management and product feedback workflows; and ensuring there is one measurement philosophy that the entire organization is bought into and using for reporting.

Additionally, training initiatives, social media policies and guidelines, along with moderation policies must be documented, approved and then rolled up into a co-created governance model. This ensures that there is message consistency globally, a legal documentation that protects the organization, empowers employees and ensures that everyone is on the same page.

A tech veteran, Michael Brito is senior vice president of social business planning at Edelman Digital. His new book, “Smart Business, Social Business,” has just been released. Learn more at http://thesocialbusinessbook.com.