Well, I am at the end of a very tiring day. An earlier than planned start due to Oscar’s decision to wake up at 5am, meant that I turned up at the Dell B2B Social Media Huddle looking pretty knackered. However, there was a real buzz around the day with some good speakers lined up and a really interesting variety of agencies. I’m not going to review each speaker, but the morning session was hosted by Kerry Bridge and presentations involved Neville Hobson, the fascinating Stephen Lamb, and Benjamin Ellis.
It was clear from these speeches that we still have alot to learn about social media B2B. Much of the conversation amongst attendees during the breaks was the lack of clear B2B examples. I think this is a real weakness, not in the day, but in the industry. There have not been any case studies that I can think of, although the guys at Salesforce clearly demonstrated a very interesting tool, plus LinkedIn showcased a decent Philips example of usage of Healthcare groups.
It was also clear that everyone had the same ideas about key things for social media. Keywords for the day were: Listen, Be Transparent, Be Honest, Everything On-Demand, Measure. The measurement part was interesting…the idea being, keep it small and make sure you measure it. The one thing that did keep getting mentioned alongside this was… just how do we get clients/brands to do social media?
This is where the breakout groups came in. Ours, ably led by Will McInnes from NixonMcInnes, tried to determine what it is drives companies to trial b2b social media. Personally, I think its personal experience which drives two business requirements 1) the need to make the business more efficient 2) the need to future proof the business. More efficient through the opening up of more channels, futureproofed through the use of new communication channels.
However, we did determine the fact that social media usage can fit into two categories – “Fear” and “Greed”. Fear being the viewing of competitors in the marketplace, wanting to know what people are saying, panicking about the future and future technologies. Greed was about the desire to beat your competitors, to be a first mover, to dominate every b2b touchpoint.
