Social Media Tools Week

Most people don’t know how to use Social Media effectively. They spend a few minutes on Twitter or LinkedIn and then decide that it’s all a waste of time because they haven’t seen immediate benefits. The problem is that many resellers and partner managers don’t really understand how these tools work – even down to the basics like how to create an effective profile or how to get the right followers on Twitter. The truth is that Social Media can be downright confusing to newbies.

Next month, there will be an excellent opportunity to begin solving this problem. Partner managers can learn how various social media tools work and how they can be used effectively in a B2B context. They just have to attend Social Media Tools Week and pay attention.
Spread over five days, from November 16 to 21, the Social Media Tools Week will feature a program of keynote presentations and “career development sessions” by industry experts, including a session on distribution channels.

There is a detailed agenda on the event site, but the emphasis is on explaining the most popular tools and how they might be useful to business people. Participants also get a free social media tool that is useful for keeping track of important people like prospects, customers, and reseller executives (where they post and what they say).

Early registration is free until Nov 10. After that its $35. Every Channel Manager should attend with their best partners because it’s an impressive group of speakers and you will learn a lot about Social Media and how it can be used effectively.

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Social Media Useful Highlights

Social Media Tools Week

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Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde

The most famous story of a split personality was written by Robert Louis Stevenson in 1886. Called Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, it was for its time, a shocking description of what happens to a respected (but repressed) citizen named Dr. Jekyll who drinks a strange potion that causes him to lose his inhibitions and turn into unpredictable and evil Mr. Hyde.

This story often comes to mind when discussing "Corporate Social Media" with corporate clients because many organizations have developed a split personality when it comes to using social media. At work, organizational pressures force most channel managers to behave like conservative and old-fashioned Dr. Jekyll. They are discouraged by corporate firewalls and sometimes the direct orders of their executives regarding the use of social media to achieve business objectives. Then, from a corporate perspective, these same people can quickly turn into a communications Mr. Hyde when they have a little free time and access to their own personal computer or high-tech cell phone.

Recently, I met a friend for lunch. She is a channel marketing executive at a big (really big) technology company. My first question when I was sitting in a company conference room was "Do you guys use social media to communicate with resellers?" Her answer, “Not really. Most sites like Facebook and Twitter are blocked and I don’t have time to stay current on all the most popular business sites myself.” She went on, “The marketing department hired an agency to post some comments and start some discussions – just to have some visibility in social media. But there aren’t any company initiatives or anything to move our channel partners forward on this.”

We eventually went to a local restaurant and talked about her experiences with Twitter. When she has free time, she uses her phone to tweet as often as possible. Then the conversation turned to LinkedIn, and how her profile would have to look if she has to get a new job. She gave me the link to what she described as incredibly useful blog on channel issues. We also talked about Whole Foods on Twitter and Domino’s Pizza on YouTube and so forth. It was all about her using social media at home, at Starbucks, and everywhere else she had access.

We returned to the office and went back to the conference room to talk about channel strategy. We discussed new marketing programs, leads, promotions, training, advertising and all the traditional things companies do with their channel. But she did not want to talk about social media or trying to find new ways to market her company’s products to resellers or their customers through the social web. She didn’t think her company was ready for it.

Over lunch my friend was a social media enthusiast, had great ideas and talked about several ways that social media was enhancing her life . From a traditional viewpoint, she was an uncontrolled and energetic Mr. Hyde. However, as soon as we re-entered the corporate office, this channel manager became an uninspired Dr. Jekyll and reverted to the same old channel thinking of the past ten years.

There are a lot of companies that are wary of social media and are trying hard to maintain Dr. Jekyll standards of communications. They say their company is not ready for social media, and besides they don’t see the business value. The truth is that these organizations are made up of people – and today these people read blogs, connect in social networks, find jobs on LinkedIn, check YouTube for the latest sensation, and tweet just for the novelty of it.

But they are not yet connected to their customers or even to their best partners through the social web.

In the end of the book, Dr. Jekyll kills himself to make sure that the evil Mr. Hyde does not do any more damage to society. Probably, the social media story is going to end the same way. Some companies are going to damage themselves by trying to maintain the status quo while their employees, resellers, and customers move into the future. Human behavior has apparently not changed a lot since 1886.

Mike Dubrall is Managing Director of Gilwell Group, a consulting company that specializes in “Channels of the Future” research. He is a regular blogger in the Integrated mar.com Partner Manager Community and his own “Channels of the Future blog is at http://www.gilwellgroup.com/. Join the LinkedIn Channels of the Future Community.

Major contributions to this blog came from Axel Schultze, founder of the Social Media Academy, Chairman of Xeequa Corp. , and author of Channel Excellence.

@AxelS & @MikeDubrall

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Social Media Useful Highlights

Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde

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Channels of the Future Webcast

The Trusted Business Advisor (TBA) webcast on Social Media and Resellers was well attended and participants asked a lot of very good questions. All confirming that social media is having a big impact on the IT value chain – and resellers want to understand how to use these new tools to their advantage. Since most vendors are not helping resellers move into the future, the channel has to figure it out themselves, with a little help from their friends at Mar.com and Gilwell Group.

Much of the information presented during the webinar came from the TBA research program, which is measuring reseller adoption of next generations tools and products like social media and SaaS. These on-line surveys have been continuously emailed to resellers since February. Approximately 250 surveys have been completed to date. Most of the results are freely available at This Link

The most interesting discovery is that resellers who report year-on-year revenue increases are using social media significantly more than partners who report that their revenue is flat or declining. Most likely, there is a stronger correlation between reseller success and early adopter behavior than between growth and social media use. Still, current social media usage is obviously one indicator of reseller revenue growth potential.

The presenters discussed the shrinking channel and gave some reasons for it: the economic downturn, consolidation, morphing of traditional resellers into consulting organizations, and fewer entrepreneurs in IT as the industry matures. Even though this issue elicited several questions, we are still looking for the data that backs up these assertions. While everyone is talking about fewer resellers this year, we don’t yet have the numbers to tell us how many, what kinds, or why.

Social Media is changing the traditional solution-oriented sales process. Customers increasingly expect that competent salespeople will do much of their discovery on-line and arrive at their first meeting with an understanding of their company, product needs, and purchasing process. Conversely, salespeople can expect that qualified buyers will research them on-line and draw conclusions about their competency from their profiles in spaces like LinkedIn, Facebook, and BlogSpot. Cold calls are no longer effective in selling IT products and services.

The ROI of social media usage is a another hot topic. In many ways, it is as difficult to calculate an ROI on social media as it is with any other marketing investment. Organizations and people use social media because it makes communication easier, not because there is a clear ROI. Since communication is a big part of doing business, there are clear (if unquantifiable) benefits to using new tools. However, organizations that have good data on activities associated with communications will be able to calculate the ROI. Examples include measuring the cost for a sales contact, a proposal, a support call, technical problem resolution, etc. There is good information about social media ROI from Forrester. Some of it available at www.lithum.com. (Lithium a leader in enterprise on-line communities.)

The realization that vendors were strengthening relationships directly with end users through social media – and bypassing the channel completely -- was no surprise. Vendors have always marketing directly to end users. However, what is alarming to the channel is that social media provides a two-way dialogue and smart vendors are gathering customer information which might be useful for future on-line sales initiatives. If customers, after engaging in an on-line community, decide that they want to purchase a product they have been discussing, it’s easier to just click over to an electronic storefront. In these cases, reseller disintermediation could become an issue again.

Several resellers asked during the webinar about getting started with social media. For this, I recommend the following two blogs. Both provide some information on steps that you can take today.

Social Media 101 for Channel Managers at . This Link

The End of Email at This Link

In addition, there are literally thousands of web sites, blogs, and tutorials on how to increase business performance and improve your personal life with social media tools. Just spend some time with Google and you will have more reference sites than you can handle.

If you want to hear the webinar, follow this link. https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/752358161

Mike Dubrall is Managing Director of Gilwell Group, a consulting company that specializes in “Channels of the Future” research.

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