Relationship of Social IRM to Social CRM

We manage relationships. "Social media" has opened up a new appreciation for more equitable and more respectful relationships with customers and new influencers. The best businesses didn't need social media crisis to drive them to treat people well. Others learned they must or risk a public kerfafle.

We started by managing relationships with influencers from high-reach bloggers to well-connected design-enthusiasts to regular folks who were both relevant and influential as determined by their followers. Short and long tail influencers. Our goal is to encourage ("earn") some form of word of mouth (aka advocacy or "earned media"). That is not CRM.

Customer relationship management refers to the discipline of managing customer relationships to optimize their profitability. How that "profitability" manifests itself is up to the enterprise. It might be simple short term transactions (more purchases this quarter). It might be long  term customer value ("lifetime customer value").

Social CRM is when we combine the two - Social IRM and CRM. Thats when we can combine our database of influencers, the data that tracks their advocacy or WOM and our customer and sales data. It requires us to value both revenue and advocacy to even be bothered. It will be the infrastructure that preoccupies enterprise for the next 5 years.

More on Social CRM

Comments

[twitter.com/mjayliebs]

John,

This is an interesting perspective. While I will not dispute the relationship, I believe you have short-changed the value of Social CRM. In other words the picture is incomplete.

What is missing is the following (and my list is also incomplete, just some top level ideas).

1 - What is in it for the customer? This is a very company centric, Inside-out view of what Social CRM can and should be

2 - Communications/Process - You silo CRM as about data, but nothing about process. Data without process is not really valuable.

I will not dispute the IRM addition, just mention that Social CRM is a lot more than you state.

Mitch

[Paul May]

Your point about infrastructure integration is dead-on. I think it's worth noting that the line between IRM and SCRM is very fuzzy because the line between "influencer" and "prospect/customer" is so fine (particularly as you move into the long tail)...take b2b software as an example. In the past, prospects had limited access to actual customers to help guide their decision process. Today, in many cases, the biggest word-of-mouth influencers are customers/prospects participating in communities and forums.

IMO, the long-term health of the PR industry is largely tied to broadening the definition of "influencers" in a way that incorporates the changing nature of an influencer. If you just think of influencer relations as an evolution of media relations, you end up with strategies and business models that are just an evolution of traditional PR. If instead you define an influencer as "someone who influences a purchase decision," you end up with a much different set of strategies and business models.

[discount coach]

May its blessings lead into a wonderful day for you and all whom you hold dear. What a wondeful blog. I like it very much . Thank you for your shaving.