For B2B social success - businesses must first look inward

It's hard to have a conversation at the agency these days that doesn't invovle social media.  It comes up when discussing advertisiging campaigns, content marketing ideas, engagement strategies and even agency operations. But one area where the topic has traditionally been less present is B2B marketing.  So when I was asked to contribute a guest post to the B2B Insights Blog, a prominent B2B blog from Godfrey, I jumped at the opportunity.  Guest bloggers were asked to give their thoughts on the future of social media and B2B marketing.  I've cross-posted my response below.

The question of where social media is going and how its growth affects B2B companies is huge and can quickly lead to in-depth discussions on lead generation tactics, data analysis techniques and which social monitoring tools are best for B2B. But for B2B companies to truly have success in using social media to reach their audience, build brands and grow business, they need to make sure their companies are embracing these ideals in how they operate, communicate with employees and collaborate internally.

This has been the big challenge for companies, B2B firms especially. Many of the tools, sites and platforms have been geared towards connecting people and more recently connecting brands with people. However, social media resources geared towards businesses have been hard to come by. As a result, social media has been making its way into B2B companies, but in a bottom-up, grassroots fashion. While these tools work for progressive individuals within an organization, the lack of scalability, customization and control have made corporate adoption problematic.

But with the overall growth of social media comes niche players that see opportunity in helping corporate America be more social. Big business players like Salesforce.com are offering free social platforms like chatter.com that combine twitter-like microblogging with the security that businesses need. Other start-ups like Yammer are offering full social platforms to business with the goal of harnessing all of the power of social networks like Facebook, without the fear of sharing their data and letting others in on their internal workings. And these are just a few of the latest tools. Established players like SlideShare and LinkedIn are becoming more and more of everyday life for today's B2B marketers in how they communicate with themselves, collaborate, conduct research and find talent.

Corporate America's adoption of social media's tools and principles into how they operate and collaborate internally – and the shifts in philosophy, policies, digital infrastructure and leadership that accompany such a shift – will be one of the most important developments social media will have on B2B marketing. Only when we truly understand and embrace social media internally, will we be able to use it to develop powerful sustainable, profitable relationships with our customers.