4 Things to Consider When Getting Started with Social CRM

Social CRM has become a buzzword that many organizations struggle to understand.  Is it CRM?  Is it a technology?  Is it just the use of Social Media for business purposes?  There is not one consistent answer and the market for Social CRM technologies continues to evolve.  But businesses are learning how Social Media can positively impact their organizations.  As you begin the journey to leveraging Social Media, and eventually tackling the challenge of integration into their CRM applications, here are a few items to consider… 

1. Have a strategy.  Identify what part of your business Social Media can have a positive impact on and focus there first?  Where are you struggling?  Recruiting, acquiring new leads, getting found for your services are all popular reasons companies are leveraging Social Media.  Figure out what business issue you want to address. 
2. Have measurable goals.  How will you know if Social Media helped if you don’t measure the improvement?  Maybe it is the number of new leads in a 4 month period.  Maybe it is a reduction in time from lead to opportunity.  Make it something you can measure.
3. Start small and grow.  If this is your first foray into Social Media, find a project that is easy to accomplish and target a specific Social Media channel to work with.  For example, maybe it is simply creating a presence on Facebook.  Over time you can include videos, surveys, twitter, etc.  Don’t try to do it all at once.
4. Don’t forget your internal business processes.  Your processes will change, be prepared and think through this.  If you begin tweeting, you need to develop processes on who, what, when, etc.  If blogging is your initiative, how will you make sure you have enough content?  Will you have an approval process?  What frequency?  Who decides the topics?  Is this owned by Marketing or the Engineers?  There are lots of questions that you need to address up front.

If you’d like to learn more, read our white paper on how business are utilizing social CRM to enhance your business relationships.  In the meantime, good luck with your initiatives and if you have not started, now is the time!

By: Mike Nafziger – National Microsoft Dynamics CRM partner

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Mike Nafziger