Perhaps it is just me but I have noticed that when something doesn’t go our way during the course of our interactions with a company, we are very quick to call out how the organization doesn’t get social business. Sometimes the reverse is also true. Something good happens and we praise the company as getting “social business.” It’s as if we are basing these characterizations on single instances of disappointment or satisfaction. Furthermore these experiences are also subjective.
Just because something good or bad happens when we interact with a brand doesn’t mean they get social business or that they don’t get social business. It’s not quite so simple to paint every organization with such a broad brush, especially when social business today doesn’t really mean anything, ask several people to explain it and you will get many different responses.
Companies aren’t as simple as would like them to be, they can’t just change something because we want them to (look at the airline industry as a simple example). We don’t know the inner workings of most businesses today and because of our ignorance it’s very easy to call-out or praise a company for doing something. Let’s all just take a big breathe and put away our “social business” paint brushes until the walls really get dirty.
Great reminder, Jacob! It’s easy to quickly dismiss a company as not “getting social” (especially when your job is centered around it), even though you might not necessarily understand the inner workings of their business. Social might just not be the right fit at that time or for that project.
It also seems like a moving target because “Getting” something at one particular time does not mean that an organization’s growth is finished. The evolution of social business continues and probably varies from industry to industry. In the future a social business may just mean a well-run, customer-focused business. Thanks for sharing!