Social CRM in Media industry

Following previous blog entries on the Innova Institute Social Media research project, this time we would like to share with you the insights gathered on the current situation of Social CRM in the Media industry.

The advent of the Internet started an ongoing change on media consumption habits. The media industry actors (including newspapers and magazine publishers, television and radio stations among others) have been rushed to reassess the validity of their value propositions, producing a constant restructuring of the actor’s roles and position in the industry.

On top of the ongoing transformation, the Social Media revolution has further accelerated the pace of change and dynamism in the industry. Social Media tools have opened new interactive communication channels between organizations and their individual clients, users and communities. In addition, it has also fostered the production and large-scale distribution of user generated content; as a result, social networks are shaping up as a potential replacement for traditional media outlets.

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The data collected in the research shows that Media industry organizations have introduced Social Media in marketing and sales activities. For example, CCMA (Catalan Multimedia Corporation) has implemented rapid response social sale systems, enhancing the virality of their contents and the engagement of the content consumer in the development and promotion of their products. In addition, there are some cases where Social Media tools have been introduced to enhance internal collaboration processes improving innovation capabilities and performance (see the case of El Terrat).

Besides these cases of advanced Social Media usage, there is still room for growth in the Media industry Social CRM adoption; organizations see opportunities to: promote user interaction during the social selling, exploit networked innovation opportunities, and further advance in the integration of social media in the organization’s internal collaboration mechanisms.

In conclusion, the analysis done captures the interest of organizations to pursue a new framework of Customer Relationship Management in the Social CRM space. Nevertheless, such interest will need to be supported by more fine-grained analytical and measurement tools that offer some guidance to CRM execution in this new context.

We welcome your comments on your experience using Social Media tools for your CRM, what challenges you have seen in relation to the introduction of Social Media in your organization?