Fortune 500 CIOs Blocking Social Media (& Its Benefits)
In the past months I’ve had the opportunity to meet with a number of Fortune 500 companies’ marketing and communications executives to discuss the digital media landscape and new opportunities. Invariably we end up taking a look at social sites like YouTube, flickr, MySpace and Wikipedia to determine how their brands are represented. More than 80 percent of the executives I’ve met are surprised about what’s going on these sites. The folks at Darden were amazed, for instance, in how often their brands are mentioned on myspace. Listerine brand managers were a little surprised to find kids doing this on youtube. Nike managers were pleased to learn that their customers take photos of their shoes and post them on flickr. One reason many of the executives with whom I meet are surprised about how their brands are represented on these sites is this: They can’t access them. Their CIOs and IT groups have blocked the sites so they can’t be viewed or monitored from inside their corporate firewalls. That’s nuts. The companies that block social media sites are missing out on valuable customer feedback, competitive intelligence, marketing opportunities and important early warning signals on issues that could turn into full-blown crises if not managed properly. Marketing, brand management and PR executives should engage their CIOs to gain access to these fast-growing sites. It can take days to gain approval and execute the changes in a major corporation. You don’t want to have to “stand in line” in the heat of a crisis situation.
One Response to “Fortune 500 CIOs Blocking Social Media (& Its Benefits)”
1 Steffen Lüders 3 October 2006 @ 11:08 am
The ability to handle a crisis is certainly very dependent on how fast you are able to react and respond with the right actions and messages to the right people. 24 hours or more is an eternity in 2006 if the issue or crisis is of some importance to someone, and I am certain that all major companies will have to get their acts together in the digital media landscape in the few years to come. Those not doing it will be subject to critism from their shareholders. One of the major challenges here is that it is not only important to monitor english speaking sites if you are a global company, but you also have to do it in a number of major languages too. And in top of that you also have to deal with the fact that issues management can be very different depending on the tradition and culture of the country. Think Global - Act Local.
This is written by someone from the outskirts of the civilized world; Denmark with 5 million inhabitants.
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