Social networking. Everyone will have heard of Friendsreunited. But there are others: Friendster, Friendzy, Friendsyourway, Friendset, to list only those that include the word ‘friend’! All of course share a common goal: to link communities, friends, and friends-of-friends to enable them to ‘network’, and grow their social circle based around some common interest.
The power of such sites has spawned new entrants to the market, taking a proven concept and making it better. 2Bmates.com is one such example, a site for creatives devised by creatives. But it has also given birth to a ‘new’ industry, taking the ‘social’ concept of networking and transplanting it into the business world. Welcome to Corporate Social Networking (CSN).
CSN is the reciprocal process of exchanging leads, recommendations, and other information through networks of established relationships to make business processes easier and more profitable. Those who engage in business networking tend to increase their number of referrals, strengthen their own name, their company name and their reputation. In short, it becomes an essential part of the sales and marketing process.
A higher networking plane
Business networking via the web takes the concept to another level. Several companies, iConcertina Creative included, are developing software that enables professionals to build the relationships they have formed, and crucially to enhance their network still further by using the ‘social’ ethos of the social sites.
Take a typical mid-to-large corporate enterprise. Several hundred staff based around a number of locations around the UK, and an office on the Continent, and perhaps agency contacts in the Far East or US in different time zones. Apart from the annual sales conference, these people might never meet. There is no structured forum for them to ‘share’. If the potential existed to harness the knowledge and information inherent within that network but in a social environment the benefits are obvious.
Issues are often resolved, information exchanged, and relationships strengthened by socialising with one’s colleagues. Consider the potential, therefore, of an online business networking solution that operates in much the same way. A virtual pub.
These sites work in a similar way to the friendship sites, but with a business slant. Profiles of individuals, their skill-sets, qualifications, responsibilities, interests etc. can be stored and mapped against their colleagues. The space can be personalised, based on the type of business, the geographies and the industries operated in.
Collaborative culture
At its most fundamental, CSN engenders a more collaborative culture, with the ability to network 24/7. The ability to search provides the means to uncover hidden connections between employees: language skills, for example; knowledge of a specific industry, sector or product; client relationships that have existed previously.
Such information should already be shared, but often isn’t. Consider how many more lead opportunities could be generated if there was an established dialogue? Think how many new business tenders are missing a killer insight, simply because the individual in the network who could provide such insight wasn’t asked or known?
Business networking gives instant access to professionals worldwide. It helps form new alliances and build real teams, but crucially it does so in a timely fashion. Unlike an intranet where many of the tools are inherently flat business networking like this is in real time. For it to succeed, however, requires fundamental management prejudices to be overcome. Cynics who already perceive their colleagues as spending too much time online will need to be convinced that far from wasting time, business networking is in fact a time saver, and of significant value.
The panacea is to take the inter-company concept of networking and extend it across different enterprises. The ultimate benefit will be for disparate businesses to share information where there is mutual advantage to be had. The process is still the same; the potential for growing businesses, however, is substantial.
Networking in this way is more than just about sales. It is where sales meets marketing, meets internal communications, meets human resources, meets purchasing. But most of all, it’s where business meets common sense.
