BIZTECHBUZZ in the world of social, cognitive, IoT and startups

Category: social networking

Digital relationships: make them personal to drive conversions says Patrick Salyer, Gigya!

With over 2bn people with a social account, partnering with social networks can help you understand a lot about your customers says Patrick Salyer, CEO, Gigya. His solution interacts with platforms like Facebook Connect to tell you who your customers are, what they like, their behaviors.

For instance, joint IBM/Gigya customer 24 Hour Fitness uses Gigya to understand more about the interests of their customer base and know who is most influential!

Learn more about building digital relationships with Gigya

Top 3 Social Media Accidents and how to avoid them!

I was driving home tonight and had to avoid a highway due to an accident.   It got me thinking about how to avoid Social Accidents.

The Three Most Common Social Accidents: 

1.   Talking only about your offering, service, product.   Social media is about forming relationships and every relationship is about both listening and speaking!.   Did you know that you can spot a healthy relationship by paying attention to how well the two people listen to each other!.   Don’t have an accident and have everyone avoid you by only talking and not listening.  Share other’s content and promote others’ ideas as well as your own.

Action:   If you communicate 6 things socially, 4 of those 6, or 67% should be showcasing content from your influencers. The other items you should be showcasing are your Point of View or Subject Matter Expertise .  Something of value!

2. Being inconsistent.   What an accident occurs when you have a professional picture on LinkedIn but a causal beach pic on your facebook?    Be consistent with your brand just as you would consistently in person.     Remember, every experience with your brand is non neutral so make each one count toward your brand goal.

Action:  Think through purposefully what you want your brand to stand for. Always ask “is what I am doing right now consistent with that brand value”

3. Not having a social media policy.    Companies who do not have a policy usually do not have strong employee usage of social because no one knows what they can and cannot do.  A policy empowers employees to speak on your brand’s behalf.  And employees are your biggest brand ambassadors!

Action:  Create a Social Computing Policy!   Check out IBM’s! http://www.ibm.com/blogs/zz/en/guidelines.html

Social enables stronger ways to network – an important career progression task!

According to IBM Tech Trends Report, there are more companies today doing internal Social, than external use of social with clients.  Why is that trend progressing? 

Creating an inclusive work environment should be a strategic priority for all companies. It can help your company build a distinctive and compelling reputation as a worldclass employer and foster women’s leadership talent.  Such a culture provides the social infrastructure that gives women access to the same career support as men.  A Social Infrastructure enables collaboration and networking across an organization. 

Networking is very important in career progression.  In fact, in every leadership book that I have read, networking in always in the top 3 items that help to drive someone to success.   So in leadership, being an active and politically-skilled networker is important.

Our study shows that working long hours is not directly linked to career progression. We can therefore debunk the myth that presenteeism leads to promotion.   However, working more hours is related to important careerenabling factors. When you work longer hours, whether you’re male or female, you’re more likely to focus on networking.

Social can enable you to network more effectively.  Networking really is as important as everyone makes it out to be. Find ways of building one-to-one relationships with people who are important to your career and keep them up-to-date on your progress.   And make time to Social Network — it really is important and effective.