2013 TAC Workshop - Industry Social Technology Presented by Ben Tutt

Application of Social Tech in Industry  Clearly the primary goal is to generate revenue and profits, and this can be achieved in numerous ways and is often highly dependent on the specific industry, the product, and the customer  In many consumer industries social tech is used to drive brand affinity- a personal or emotional connection to a brand, which is viewed as a stronger connection with the customer than brand loyalty  Social media is used to monitor customer perception of the company and its products and to try to influence those views- reputation management  Internal business benefits- value generator in a workplace that relies on collaboration, and communication across many people, sites, and countries 2

Example- FedEx After the 2010 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico FedEx learned that a rare breed of sea turtles was at risk. The company donated “vibration free” trucks and logistics expertise to assist with the delicate operation of moving highly fragile turtle eggs to safer nesting areas. FedEx used social media outlets like Twitter to help tell the story about the eggs’ journey as it unfolded, and received high praise from consumers and environmentalists who shared this heartwarming story with many others. In turn, these same consumers now feel a far stronger emotional connection to FedEx. What was a very low cost project for FedEx, as the trucks were already in the area, netted them significant social endorsement and further strengthened their positive personal connections to their social community. 3

Example- Nike+ If you are a runner you may be familiar with Nike+, it’s essentially a device embedded in a shoe that communicates with another mobile device But to call Nike+ a "product" is shortsighted. It is billed as an experience comprised of a device, software, community and extended community - all enabled through social collaboration concepts. It has won a very wide range of awards throughout the advertising and user interaction industry. Nike Plus allows runners to coordinate their runs with music, obtain feedback throughout their run and view results within a customer extranet. Within the extranet Nike offers feedback to runners, allows them to engage in challenges, offers training advice and as you may expect, allows for the purchase of merchandise and music. Nike Plus has integration within Facebook and Twitter allowing a runner to update their status indicating they are embarking on a run. The update is triggered when the run starts. Likes or comments trigger the runner's audio device to play a sound 4

Examples of Non-Marketing Uses IBM has an internal platform the enables users to chat/blog/share across the company, an application that is searched almost 1 million times a week- used to share knowledge and locate the most relevant expert across the entire company Dell uses the salesforce.com add-on Chatter to share sales notes across the entire sales force Software companies (Google, Microsoft etc) utilize crowdsourcing (low or unpaid web recruits) to test applications more rapidly and to a broader extent than they could internally 5

Application of Industry Experience for AIAA Private companies have long used social technologies to both drive revenue and improve efficiencies The incorporation of strategies used in industry to market products can be modified to market conferences and courses prior to the event- twitter, facebook, blogs, prizes, youtube videos Equally, many strategies and applications that improve internal efficiencies can be utilized to facilitate collaboration during conferences or events Companies plan complete marketing campaigns or efficiency roll-outs, they are rarely standalone components, maximum benefits are realized when a variety techniques are integrated Such strategies work when they offer something valuable and useful to the consumer, a good example is the conference app Many of these strategies will work and drive attendance or interest but if the product is not appropriate and does not meet expectations then they are unlikely to return 6

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