I was thinking this weekend about Selfies after I saw so many taken at SXSW and highlighted in the Oscars.

I looked for some research on how prevalent this trend is becoming.  For example, a recent joint study of self-portraits in social media by three universities in the U.K. found that aggressively posting self-portraits on Facebook can alienate our friends and loved ones.  In another example, the study found that selfies compose a 30% of images snapped by everyone’s favorite demographic — the much-beloved millennial!!

So much focus now on “it’s all about me”. But you get more success when social is used for “value” of all opinions and offering a point of view.  

I think the leaders of social should push for sharing and valuing others.   determining what others need helps to spur on innovation and a focus outside yourself, vs inside your company.

The top ten most innovative companies had two-year compound annual growth rates of 60 percent more than the overall Standard and Poors Global.  For these companies, innovation is much more than a “big idea.” Innovation is an ongoing process of creating value from something new, such as new ideas, new technologies, new products or new processes. For example, 75 percent of successful companies rely on social networks to vet new ideas for success. They use them for:

  • Openly communicating strategy
  • Openly generating and prioritizing non-traditional ideas for new products and services
  • Innovating operations by teaming with external specialists and business partners
  • Innovating business models by combining emerging technologies with business imperatives to redefine the value chain or move into entirely new industries

Your influence matters!!  Encourage others and companies to :

  • “Engage the crowd” (internal and external) to vet new ideas not just sell their own
  • Deploy a portal that combines content, social and advanced mobile features to provide an exceptional digital experience for customers, partners, and employees to make it easy to share ideas
  • Deploy social gamification and social rewards systems to improve engagement and sharing