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The Smart Techie was renamed Siliconindia India Edition starting Feb 2012 to continue the nearly two decade track record of excellence of our US edition.

Master the Art

Christo Jacob
Monday, July 2, 2012
Christo Jacob
Gone are the days where social media and personal gadgets were considered as a nuisance in the work place. I still remember when I started my career; most of the organizations were not embracing the usage of mobile phone or any other personal gadget and kept away from social media platform activities at workplace. But today, it's good to see a sea change, where BYOD policies are embraced by enterprises and most of them taking social media software as a very serious concern as they are aligning into their business focus to add value to its customers. Thanks to Oracle, Salesforce.com, Microsoft and IBM. But is this buzz word "Social Media CRM" going to vanish soon?

Yes, slowly it's going to. The majority of businesses are still handling their own social network accounts, but about 28 percent have started outsourcing these services. Whether outsourced or not, over half of the businesses that take advantage of the social enterprise have seen reduced marketing costs. Furthermore, sales from social media are expected to hit an impressive $30 billion by 2015. As most enterprises are fetching impressive results from this activity, they are being pressured to keep their customer relationships strong by adding a social media mix to their marketing and sales efforts. They should also realize social does not end at your customer. Social media connected with your CRM software can bring together the sales, marketing, and customer service departments. That's exactly the reason why Microsoft do not want to miss the opportunity and it propelled Microsoft to acquire the social enterprise network Yammer for $1.2 billion.

Though it currently holds good for these enterprise Social media CRM, if approached correctly while being willing to change as generations flux, will likely evolve into an inherent part of overall customer relationship management. What we have to think today is to how to engage next generation; the generation who cannot imagine "a life before internet" and email is considered for "Old people". The sales people have to think out of the box and use multiple platforms to sell their product rather than engaging in just social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook and others. For instance already, manufacturers like Audi and Ford are developing in-car platforms that will deliver personalized information to enhance the ride for both the passenger and the driver. Moreover, many retailers are already experimenting with interactive screens in-store to deliver personalized recommendations. It’s no more going to be days of "Like" buttons in Facebook, but rather should be challenged to design campaigns that work across multiple platforms creating a personal impact. So it is time to move away from the "traditional approach". Master the art of understanding the customer behavior and then you can see the next generation hook to your campaigns.
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