Social Medias Role in the Development of Local and International Businesses - Case Study Example

Running head: SOCIAL NETWORK 11th March Introduction As the demand for products and services increase in the local and in the international markets, firms that are focused at attaining a competitive edge and sustainable profits have now turned to social networking as a communication method. In the contemporary world, social media is a major avenue through which companies advertise their brands globally. Based on the large number of social media users, communication between business to business as well as that of business to consumers has become effective. As entrepreneurs seek for more ways through which communication should be improved for the benefits of businesses, innovation in the social media has resulted to various social sites. Some of the notable social media sites include Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Google, Linkedin, NING, Writeboard and Storybird among others (Christakis and Moreno, 2009). The establishment of web-based business operations has made local and global companies to effectively penetrate international market. Having been advocated for by various social computing supporters, business analysts and entrepreneurs, social networking services are now being used by managers to communicate with their work force. To gain from the benefits of social media, firms have embarked on adopting social networking technologies. This is an aspect that is referred social business by IBM. This paper seeks to analyze the exploitation of innovation within IBM that has been depicted by the establishment of Social Business. Organizational learning approach Firms such as IBM that significantly emulate social media in their communication systems are referred to as social businesses. This implies that Social Business goes beyond having a twitter account or a face book page. Additionally, social business ensures that a significant level of collaboration among all the employees and departments as well as with the external environment. According to IBM, social businesses indicate three major characteristics. First, it is the strong level of engagement. This implies that they create a strong connection among all stakeholders including employees, customers and the employees (Johnson, 2005). As a result, each of the individual is able to learn from other an aspect that makes them to be productive and improve on their efficiencies. Secondly, is the high level of transparency. This implies that social business have embarked on removing barriers that hinder sending of information within the organization. As the result of removing information barriers, there is an effective alignment of business operations (Gentle, 2012). Thirdly, social business depicts the aspect of speed. By ensuring that information within an organization is passed in a quick way, it is possible for social business to utilize the emerging opportunities. As a social business, IBM has the opportunity of adopting new patterns as well as business outcome. For example, the employees are in a position to learn new approaches and methods of undertaking their duties. According to studies done by McKinsey & Company indicates that companies adopting the Web 2.0 technology have indicated benefits including high employees performance as the result of the employees development (Li and Bernoff, 2008). Through regular training of the workforce in the areas of social soft ware and on how to use the collaborative tools, IBM professionals in the marketing department have greatly benefited. This is depicted by their improved skills on how to relate with their customers. This is a clear indication that the use of social network has brought about significant transformation in the business arena. Through the use of hardware and software by social business new pathways are established (Pajala, 2010). These includes ways through which workforce is trained on how to search for information that is highly needed to solve the problems that may exist in the social business. In this way, users of the soft ware and hard ware tools are inspired an aspect that enhances their performance. In order for a firm to qualify as a social business, the business must shape its culture through the use of long-term strategic approach. This implies that leaders must adopt effective techniques that entail use of analysts and other parties. According to the 2011 findings on the IBM social business, effectiveness in the business processes can be achieved if issues related to social business are integrated with business activities (IBM social business, 2014). According to 2010 International Data Corporation survey on social business, various employees provided different reasons as to why they prefer social business. The table below indicates various criterions that were used to evaluate the benefits of social media to a group of employees. Table 1 Evaluation criteria Percentage Clients require you to relate to them through social software 20 I get immediate feedback 25 Allows timely decision making 25 Gathering of information is easier 35 Improves my knowledge 36 It enhances my performance 37 It improves relationship internally and externally 38 It is easy and comfortable to use 50 Source (IDC White Paper Sponsored by IBM, 2011). Social media development The spirit of innovation and the aim of the entrepreneurs to make high profits led to the development of social media. This covers the creating and sharing of information through networks as well as virtual communities. Having started as analog, social media has undergone remarkable transformation. This is clearly indicated by the way IBM used the social media to transform itself into a social business (Burke et al, 2011). With a significant dependence on we-based innovations and mobile, social media creates conducive platform where by individuals can share information. As indicated by the IBM Social Business, individuals do not do business with firms but they do business with other people. Thus, the establishment of innovation of social media played an important role as far as doing business is concerned. One of the major aspects that make modern social media to differ with the traditional media is based on the quality. For example, there was no adequate storage system that the traditional media used while modern media adopts effective storage that can be retrieved even after many years. Additionally, the immediacy aspect of the current social media makes it effective and resourceful in sending urgent information to other individuals (Marche, 2012). As compared to the traditional media, modern media is used by many people. This is based on the high number of internet users. For instance, according to the research conducted by IBM, more than 110 billion minutes are used per month by the world to visit social networks (Nielsen, 2010). In order to make a successful social media, firms should follow seven major steps. The first one is to set goals. This implies that managers must make sure that the needs of their stakeholders are met by all the aspects of the social media they adopt. In the case of IBM as a social business, for example the aspect of person to person is emphasized as the key avenue of achieving the company success. Every department including marketing, human resource and customer service among others within IBM adopt social media as a key channel to perform their duties (Powell et al, 2011). The second stage in the development of a social media is deciding on the metrics that will be followed. This includes the metrics that will be adopted in evaluating the performance of the social media as well as the number of people who will use the social sites. Thirdly, a firm must determine its audience and informing all the persons concerned. In this way, a firm will ensure that all the stakeholders are trained on how to use the social media in the communication process (Motti et al, 2011). The fourth step is discovering the meeting platform that is mostly used by the parties within a firm. In this way, a manager will get a chance to communicate and train on the benefits of the social media to the employees as well as other stakeholders including the shareholders and the donors. The fifth step is gathering resources that are needed in developing the social media. These include the information technology personnel and the site designers. This step is vital in ensuring maximum security for the social media as well as a quality user friendly site. The sixth step is connecting tasks to individuals (Jue et al, 2010). This means that in order for a firm to become a social business, each of the parties concerned must play a role to ensure the successes of the social media. As a social business, IBM success is influenced by skilled managers, process designers, risk managers and financial controllers among parties. In this way, IBM has enjoyed a culture of getting support from all the stakeholders. The seventh stage in developing an effective social media is creating a good content for the users. This implies that in order for the social media to be of assistance to a firm, all the information involved in the social media must be of great assistance to the users during the performance of their duties. Knowledge management features IBM uses social media tools in order to make the employees have an improved knowledge on how to undertake various activities. Based on their usefulness in creating business value, media tools are vital in assisting the employees to come up with more innovative way of performing their duties. Thus, use of social media tools benefits IBM in three major ways. First, they provide knowledge that helps in transforming the workforce. This is based on the firm’s ability to shift its culture to a model that is corroborative in nature. As more people embark in using social media to communicate with their colleagues, it has become easier for the people to use social media tools that social businesses use to improve on their performance. Another knowledge management feature that is depicted by IBM’s use of social media is that it has improved leadership knowledge that includes introducing new solutions to the managers that helps them to solve the problems faced by partners and customers (McHale and Garulay, 2012). Similarly, the introduction of collaboration software and opportunities to share knowledge by IBM has led to creation of adequate chance through which employees and managers can discuss on various issues that affect their jobs. The third feature of the social tools that are used by IBM is that they provide adequate knowledge and innovative ways to the employees on how to deal with the demands from customers as well as market demands (Turkle, 2012). IBM has for a long time created value to different institutions through its social business. The table below indicates the various business areas that IBM assists and some of the notable organizations that have benefited. Table 2 Business area Firms that have benefited Sales and marketing Deutsche Lufthansa was helped to end redundancy and access central customer data thus reducing the errors associated with manual tracking of company transactions and customer information Product and service development Sennheiser was assisted in its effort to form global collaboration Customer services University of London created a community of approximately 40,000 members in its distance learning. Business executives and human resources CEMEX developed a portal that connected 17,000 workers while at the same time creating 400 communities Extent of subsequent innovation As the result of continued use of social media as a means of communication by individuals as well as companies, subsequent innovation has emerged. Through the introduction of social media tools, firms have benefited from the creativity that entails new marketing strategies as well as management policies. Additionally, firms such as IBM have realized that social media tools can effectively transform a company into a social business (Piskorski, 2014). For example, in the field of customer service, workers have been trained on innovative ways of managing their relationships with the customers. Additionally, the communities have been exposed to new techniques and knowledge of dealing with other members of the society (Edy, 1999). A good example of the innovation that came about due to the use of social media tools was the use of social business tools by the University of London to create a community that consisted of approximately 40,000 learners. As a result, the university saved more than £300,000 within one year. In the area of product and services development, social business has helped in accelerating services and products innovation. Likewise, it helps the partners and managers to emulate new ways of bringing products and services to the market. Through the emergence of global collaboration solution that have been adopted by firms such as Sennheiser, more advanced methods of solving problems have been innovated (Rheingold, 2002). Additionally, there have emerged superior methods of transforming huge quantity of data into knowledge base that is easily accessible. Conclusion As discussed in the paper, social media plays a major role in the development of local and international businesses. One of the major aspects of social media is creating a collaborative society that maintains an effective communication process. According to IBM, individual do business with people rather than companies. This implies that there is need for the company to maintain a strong communication system among all the parties. Social Business offers various advantages in all aspects of a business. First it helps the employees to be effective. This entails optimizing the human resource by bringing together skilled and experienced individuals as well as adequate resourceful information (Lardi and Fuchs, 2013). This has led to improved business result including improved sales and profits. Another advantage of social business is that leads to improved speed of undertaking business operations as well as high quality of services offered. This involves bringing new and innovative products and services in the market at a higher speed as the result of removing barriers. Similarly, it entails bringing in the market products and services that are in line with the needs of the customers (Barnhurst and Ellen, 1998). The third merit of social business is that it provides an opportunity to the customers to be deeply engaged. This implies creating differentiated experience for the customers thus making them to be attracted to the products and services resulting to achievement of stronger customer loyalty. As a social business, IBM is able to make its workers share knowledge with other stakeholders. As the result of emergence of modern social media, more innovations have emerged that have been adopted by institutions of higher learning such as the University of London as well firms like IBM. Similarly, there has been innovation in the processes of marketing and customers relations. Other firms that have been assisted by IBM include Deutsche Lufthansa, Sennheiser and CEMEX. References Barnhurst, K and Ellen, W. 1998. Young Citizens, American TV Newscasts and the Collective Memory. Critical Studies in Mass Media, pp 279-305. Burke, M., Kraut, R. and Marlow, C. 2011. Social capital on Facebook: Differentiating uses and users. Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 7-9. Christakis, A and Moreno, A. 2009.Trapped in the Net: Will Internet Addiction Become a 21st-Century Epidemic?. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 163 (10):959-960. Edy, J .1999. Journalistic Uses of Collective Memory. Journal of Communication pp 71-85. Gentle, A. 2012. Conversation and Community: The Social Web for Documentation. Laguna Hills : XML Press. IBM social business. 2014. Available at http://www.ibm.com/account/uk/en/?lnk=mmi-0-uken Retrieved March 11, 2014. IDC White Paper Sponsored by IBM. 2011. Becoming a Social Business. The IBM Story January 2011. Johnson, B. 2005. Everything Bad Is Good for You. New York: Riverhead Books. Jue, L., Jackie, M and Mary, K. 2010. Social media at work: how networking tools propel organizational performance. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Lardi, K and Fuchs, R. 2013. Social Media Strategy – A step-by-step guide to building your social business. Zurich: vdf. Li, C and Bernoff, J. 2008. Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies. Boston: Harvard Business Press. Marche, S. 2012. Is Facebook Making Us Lonely? The Atlantic. Retrieved July 12, 2013. McHale, R and Garulay, E. 2012. Navigating Social Media Legal Risks: Safeguarding Your Business. London: Sage Motti, N., Oren M and Eyal, Z. 2011. On Media Memory: Collective Memory in a New Media Age. New York : Palgrave MacMillan. Nielsen, N. 2010. Social Networks/Blogs Now Account for One in Every Four and a Half. Minutes Online. June 15, 2010. Pajala, M. 2010. Television as an Archive of Memory? Critical Studies in Television pp 133-145. Piskorski, J. 2014. A Social Strategy: How We Profit from Social Media. Princeton. NJ: Princeton University Press. Powell, R., Groves, W and Dimos, J. 2011. ROI of Social Media: How to improve the return on your social marketing investment. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Rheingold, H.2002. Smart mobs: The next social revolution. Cambridge : Perseus Pub. Turkle, S. 2012. Alone together: Why we expect more from technology and less from each other. New York: Basic Books. Appendix Table 1 Table 1 Evaluation criteria Percentage Clients require you to relate to them through social software 20 I get immediate feedback 25 Allows timely decision making 25 Gathering of information is easier 35 Improves my knowledge 36 It enhances my performance 37 It improves relationship internally and externally 38 It is easy and comfortable to use 50 Table 2 Business area Firms that have benefited Sales and marketing Deutsche Lufthansa was helped to end redundancy and access central customer data thus reducing the errors associated with manual tracking of company transactions and customer information Product and service development Sennheiser was assisted in its effort to form global collaboration Customer services University of London created a community of approximately 40,000 members in its distance learning. Business executives and human resources CEMEX developed a portal that connected 17,000 workers while at the same time creating 400 communities Read More