Manufacturing Talk: Double-dipping: social media delivers the marketing 2-in-1

There’s been a lot of talk about social media. A Q3 Forrester report showed inquiries about Web 2.0 and social media on the rise among B2B marketers, with a sharp spike in interest in the last 6 months of the report (January to July 2008). Many marketers are still finding their way around utilizing tools such as blogs and social networks in their marketing efforts, let alone making these efforts payoff with real business benefit. Now, the economy has put social media on the back burner for many B2B companies. Yet, this is just the time to take a more serious look at social media in marketing. Why? Social media lets marketers double-dip.

Marketers are the “voice of the customer” to the business, and accomplish this through market research, analysis and insights to guide product / service development (inbound). And, of course, they plan and execute activities to get customers to buy or influence other customers (outbound). The beauty of social media in B2B marketers’ kitty is that it does a bit of both, a compelling proposition in these times. For cash strapped B2B companies, effective use of social media can be more than an inexpensive alternative… it can provide a window into particularly un-expressed customer needs and preferences, yield higher returns with more effective marketing, and increase intimacy with customers. Realizing the full potential of social media in marketing involves a lot more than inserting a blog into a website. It requires re-thinking the marketing processes to engage customers vs. transactional relationships, implementing technology platforms and tools to analyze customer behavior and offer a positive interaction experience, and putting in place governance mechanisms to sustain this and reduce the risk of alienating customers, etc.

Here’s a real life example from a high-tech company.