Social Media Marketing: It’s the PROCESS dude!

One of the most important lessons that the enterprise applications software business taught me is that business processes are more important than specific enterprise applications software vendors. For example, Dell’s success was mainly due to its build to order (BTO) model, and not necessarily the ERP or supply chain software vendor that Dell used. Similarly, Southwest Airlines’ business practices led to its unparalleled performance.

Similarly, success in social media marketing will result from proper business processes and not necessarily solely from the use of any specific software platform. For example, one company may rely on Twitter whereas another may depend on a suite of different tools. What is absolutely important is to determine the set of business processes that are appropriate for each firm. As I survey the social media landscape I am amused at how there is a different flavor of the day – MySpace yesterday, Facebook today, Twitter tomorrow etc. Regardless of the specific platform, social media is here to stay. We live in an internet democracy and the users have voted – social media beats mass media, social media marketing beats traditional marketing.

For a great writeup on how social media marketing helps brands, read this post from Bob Warfield.