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In a recent post, we discussed how Social Media is making its mark on the corporate landscape. In that post, we talked at a high level about the reasons why corporations are using Social Media. These reasons included enabling communication, collaboration, and media sharing within organizations. If you have not had a chance to check out this post, you can do so here.

In today’s post, we are going to continue the discussion by specifically focusing on how organizations are applying Social Media technology to solve real business challenges. There are many applications of Social Media. Although there are many nuances in implementation applications, seven common types have bubbled to the top.

• Organizational learning, , communication, and collaboration – Resources used for people to create virtual communities focused on specific interests, roles, geographies, and professional networks.
• Innovation management – Resources used to leverage the content sharing, rating, and discussion aspects of Social Media in order to ask a population of people, “How would you solve this challenge?”
• Customer engagement and relationship building – Resources used to connect customers based on needs, purchases, and shared interests. Content and media can be shared, rated, and distributed only to those who choose to see that content.
• Recruitment – Resources used to communicate the status of job openings and recruitment events and connect applicants who share the common interest of gaining employment with an organization.
• Marketing and brand building – Resources and sites to enforce an organization’s brand by providing collaborative tools and resources for people who share common needs, experiences, and interests.
• Partner relationship – Resources used to connect partner organizations together based on needs, purchases, markets, verticals, and shared interests. Content and media can be shared, rated, and distributed only to those who choose to see that content.
• On-boarding – Websites and resources used to connect newly hired employees together so that they can share knowledge and information with each other and collaborate with seasoned employees on how to successfully navigate a new work environment.

As you plan to implement a Social Media application, it is important to point out two things:

1. Before implementing any technology, including Social Media, there must be a compelling reason for doing so. Ideally, this purpose should be rooted in the pursuit of helping solve the felt needs of the end users. Most organizations cannot afford to implement novel technology. Therefore, as you explore how your organization can employ Social Media, be sure to take the time to understand your audience and their felt needs so that you can adequately implement technology to meet those needs.
2. Although Social Media applications tend to be much more organic in nature than other enterprise technology, this does not undervalue of good implementation plan. A good implementation plan outlines a clear strategy for how the technology will be deployed and communicated. Most importantly, this plan should identify the feedback mechanisms that will be put in place to ensure that end user comments are gathered and responded to in a strategic and timely manner.

Over the last five years, the emergence of Social Media and its impact on society has been well documented. Social Media connects people with similar interests through technology, enabling them to share ideas/thoughts and media and collaborate around common interests. What separates Social Media from all of the previous technology-enabled movements is the dramatic paradigm shift in who drives and owns the content. Check out this great YouTube clip, which illustrates this point and demonstrates how Social Media works.

A recent Harris poll found that 49% of Americans are using Social Networking tools. This is an amazing statistic if one considers that most of these tools did not exist several years ago. The growth and popularity of these tools is going to continue to grow as they continue to gain acceptance and utility within the workplace. Some might argue that the adoption and use of these tools represents the next great opportunity for corporations.

But, how exactly can corporations use Social Media? To answer this question, it is important to understand the value that Social Media brings to a corporation. There are several key reasons why corporations are using or plan to adopt Social Media. These include:

• Communication – Enabling people to communicate with each other when they need to and about topics they find most important. Some examples of applications that are now in use include Blogs (Blogger, WordPress, and Vox), Microblogs (Twitter and Yammer), Social Networking (LinkedIn), and Events (Meetup and Upcoming).
• Collaboration – Tools to enable people to work together more efficiently and share common information that they deem important. Some examples of these tools include Social Tagging tools (Delicious and Digg), Wikis (Wikipedia), Virtual Environments (SecondLife), and Ratings Tools (Answers sites).
• Media Sharing – Sites and tools that enable people to share media about a specific topic or area with each other. Some examples of these tools include Photo Sharing (Flickr), Video Sharing (YouTube and Vimeo), LiveCasting (Ustream and Justin.tv), and Audio Sharing (Podcasts).

We are interested in finding out more about how your organization has implemented or plans to implement Social Media. Use the comments box below to submit your ideas and discuss them with us.