It's been over three years since Paul Greenberg and I were on Technology For Business Sake having what I think was our first CRM Playaz like conversation about Social CRM. My how time flies... I thought of this because tomorrow I'm participating in a webinar with Radian6 where we'll talk about The Evolution of Social CRM. Here are the details if you're interested in checking it out:
Title: The Evolution of Social CRM
Date: Wednesday December 15th
Time: 2pm ET
Registration: Free. Use this link to register
I'm looking forward to teaming up with Lauren Vargas (Radian6's smart and energetic Director of Community Management) to talk about where we've come from, where we are, and to take a stab at where we may be going with Social CRM. So please join us if you can!
But…does anybody really know where we'll be with this Social CRM stuff? I know I don't (but that won't stop me from throwing some things out there tomorrow…). I'm still kind of amazed how far we've come in the past couple of years… and also by how long it's taken for this to get started, but I digress. It hasn't even been a two and a half years since I had the opportunity to do my first Social CRM keynote for Intellinet's user conference. I had been writing about it for a while before then, but for the most part there wasn't much going on. But we did have folks like Paul Greenberg and Chris Carfi who were out there spreading the gospel, although Mr. G. was using the CRM 2.0 name - no we're not gonna get into the name wars here folks! In fact the first time I heard the term social crm used was back in 2006 by Kintera, and the context really had nothing to do with social media. Oracle began using the term and creating products underneath the social crm umbrella shortly afterward. Anyways, that was pretty much it. But things have changed dramatically in a couple of years.
Exhibit One - The Social CRM….Rockstars???
Social CRM is getting the kind of attention that "Classic CRM" never enjoyed. Back in 2009, for example, I participated in an event called….wait for it… The Rockstars of Social CRM. Ok, stop laughing... Radian6, the maker of popular social media monitoring tools, organized this cool event. Chris Brogan, the hardest working man in social media, hosted the evening's festivities… dressed as Professor Griff from Public Enemy. The panel (on stage mind you) was made up of folks mainly known in traditional CRM circles - the aforementioned Paul Greenberg, CRM Association president Michael Thomas, and me. The panel did include a real social media star in Frank Eliason (formerly of Comcast, now with Citibank). And hundreds of people attended in person, with even more tuning in online. But I wasn't quite sure they were tuning in to hear us talk about the integration of social media and customer relationship management, or to check the Guitar Hero contest taking place after the panel discussion.
Exhibit Two - The Hashtag: #SCRM
After writing my first whitepaper on social CRM around October of 2008, I created and started using the #scrm hashtag on Twitter. Wait a minute, I started actively using Twitter almost three years ago, and there wasn't much CRM talk going on. So when I started using the #SCRM tag, there still wasn't that many CRM conversations going on, let alone social CRM convos. About a few weeks in I kind of gave up on the hash tag. But a funny thing happened, a guy named @scorpfromhell (now known as @prem_k) started using it with a vengeance. Then other folks began using it, and then a few more joined. CRM consultants were using it. Vendors began using it. CRM media outlets began using it. Then social media stars like Brian Solis and Jeremiah Owyang even used it. Now the number of people and discussions using the #scrm tag are so many it's a struggle for me to keep up with! In fact I don't even try keeping up with it anymore because there's no way I can.
Exhibit Three - The Social CRM Vendors and Applications
A couple of years ago the only vendor I was aware of that called their products Social CRM applications were Oracle. But the apps were really focused on helping internal sales organizations be more productive and effective. And you didn't hear of any of the big vendors integrating with Twitter or most any other social network. But that has all changed. Many of the usual suspects integrate in some form or fashion with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other social networks. Enterprise social network platform providers and CRM vendors are building integrations to work with each other - and RightNow has created it's own platform with last year's acquisition of HiveLive. Additionally, relative newcomers like Radian6, Lithium Technologies, BatchBlue, JitterJam, Nimble, Bantam and a host of others that are now being referred to as Social CRM vendors. In fact I get a couple of briefing requests a week to look at various Social CRM-related products.
Exhibit Four - The University
Earlier this month the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management held a three-day course called Managing Customer Engagement Using Social Media and CRM. It was the first class under the school's recently created Centre for CRM Excellence. The course was taught by a mix of school faculty and CRM industry experts (including Paul, Esteban Kolsky, Ray Wang, Michael Wu among others), and included sessions on measuring the value of customers, the ROI of social CRM, customer-centric process design, and driving user adoption with change management.
The Centre is a partnership the university entered into with Microsoft Canada, with the objective of creating a globally-recognized hub for CRM thought leadership, research and education aimed at the CRM experts and practitioners community. And the fact they launched the center with a course focused on Social CRM is something to take note of. The idea that a major institution of higher education dedicated a three day course to the subject of Social CRM would not have happened even a few short years ago. But not only is there a class, the Centre itself emphasizes the importance of integration of social media and CRM to businesses today.
Exhibit Five - The People
One thing that has definitely changed from a year ago is the guy who runs the country. And the way he was able to obtain that job has made everybody take a good long look at how social media can help win friends and influence people. And as important as video, user-generated content and micro-blogging was to the Prez becoming the Prez, good old-fashion CRM was the foundation of the campaign, according to Blue State Digital CTO Jascha Franklin-Hodge in his keynote address during last year's Enterprise 2.0 conference.
What the Obama campaign made very apparent to us all is that the power lies in the hands of the people. If you inspire them, treat them as equals, and equip them with the tools they need, they will take the ball and run with it. Social media may get them excited, but well thought out strategies and processes, implemented successfully, will turn inspiration into activity. Given the right tools - equally important the right motivation - the people (aka prospect, customer, community member, etc.) will follow through. They want to follow through… they need to follow through…
Social CRM's Future? Ask The People
Now I don't know where all of this is going, and how long it will take to get there, wherever "there" is. I certainly didn't see the growth in interest for Social CRM coming, or why it didn't happen years before now for that matter. But one thing is for sure, the acceptance of Social CRM will not be driven by vendors or pundits, it will be driven by people and their desire to use every means available to them to communicate with each other. Twitter wasn't even a blip on the business screen two years ago, now you can't talk to anyone without them telling you their Twitter name (mine is @BrentLeary, btw…). Who knows what we'll be talking about next year. All I know is that people want easy access to good information, and to each other - for business as well as for personal reasons.
So get ready for a long, strange trip. Social CRM is here and it's being driven by the needs and wants of the social customer. Vendors better be ready for the challenge. And be able to keep up. And don't forget to join Lauren and I tomorrow to talk about the evolution of Social CRM.
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