Case Study: Interview with David Terrar
Social Media: New Approach in Customer Relationship Management
Social media has been gaining momentum and organizations are using it as a communication tools to promote their reach to the customer. Mr. David Terrar, CEO of D2C |Limited has been interviewed to find out how organization view the development of social media? How they are using it? and so on. Here is an excerpt of the interview:
(TBK) How did you become interested in social media and when did you start using it?
(DT) Well, our background is over 20 years in implementing ERP and Finance Systems in companies of all sizes from large to mid size to small. We got bored with doing that and realized the future was going to be about SaaS and Cloud Computing. So we started in 2004 to specialize on SaaS solutions because you need a different consulting approach: smaller projects, leaner, more agile approach to implementing systems; and we decided we would focus on collaboration solutions. So we have a portfolio of products that we use to provide collaboration solutions after we had been going for a year some old friends asked us to help launch their online accounting product in the UK which was a bit of a change back to our history but we talked ourselves into it because it was cloud based and because online accounting is all about accountants collaborating with their clients and the clients collaborating with their partners so we do online accounting too.
We started to get interested in wikis and blogs to help the company and I started to write a blog in 2005 and then social media became more and more of what we do.
It’s all collaboration and over time I’ve built up expertise in social media applied to the enterprise, whereas most social media “so called” experts come at this from PR and marketing. We come at this from the business so our emphasis is business processes linked in to social media tools and using those tools to link to customers and partners.
(TBK) What’s your view on social media for Business Process Optimization? In terms of operations, cost cutting, customer service and reach to new prospects.
(DT) Some people apply social media tools without trying to link to existing business processes, I think that is wrong, they should be linked or integrated to existing business processes. The tools should be applied to what the company does. it might be idea generation, or project management, or customer service or connecting to prospects, lots of ways to use social media but it should work with existing process. Eventually we’ll get integrated tools and products but we don’t have them yet, maybe a good example is sales force. There they have the sale force modules, and modules from partner eco system and the Force.com platform. But now they have Chatter – internal micro blogging and links to document repository and Sales force for twitter to link to external world to monitor who is mentioning the company or the brand. So you can begin to provide an integrated approach for collaboration around the conventional business processes. I believe this is a pointer to the way social business is heading. But the social media tools can be applied across all the business processes, all of the ERP
(TBK) How is D2C using social media to promote its business?
(DT) We blog (well it’s me really) and my blog gets published on CloudAve and Enterprise Irregulars and Word Frame Blog and a few other places too. I use twitter a lot and I am involved in a lot of social media related meet-ups and groups, run something called London Wiki Wednesdays. I helped start two things: Creative Coffee Club and Amplified so that’s all online networking to get my name and the brand known and I speak at as many events as will have me. It’s me personally, but the commercial objective is to create awareness of D2C, and to find prospects, and to find partnerships. And too because one of the things I’m passionate about is getting companies to be more creative in that they so enhance our little “brand” reputation and expertise. I’m a bit unusual in that I span across conventional enterprise ERP, and enterprise 2.0, and social media, and also creativity.
(TBK) What about some ethical issues that arose about social media? What will be the impact of it in customer confidence or, in broader terms stake-holders’ confidence?
(DT) It’s all about trust and transparency. This new world makes it very easy for your customers to find out when something goes wrong. so you need to monitor and be aware and react quickly but that also means that small companies can get well known for doing good things by the amplified “word of mouth” of social media but it’s all about being authentic and real
You need to have the right culture and policy in place. So that every employee in the company knows what is expected of them.
(TBK) What three advantages and disadvantages in using social media for business, do we need to know, in your personal experience?
(DT) Advantages:
- Increasing collaboration and building community across the organization
- Democratization of content and idea provision
- Foster creativity within the organization
Disadvantages:
- Can flatten the organization and challenge the existing structures and culture
- Can add to the information overload if the correct approach and policies aren’t in place
- Not everyone will want to participate, blog, use wikis, so it may lead to division if handled incorrectly.
(TBK) Do you expect any new developments in social media in the coming decade?
(DT) Is all about integration of social media tools with existing business processes and systems and with tools to monitor and connect the company externally. I don’t think “social” is the right word and I think within that decade we will call it something else but it will be integrated social business tools across the whole of the organization. Enterprise 2.0 isn’t the right term either whoever invents the new term will make some good money like O’Reilly with the web 2.0 term.
(TBK) How will a company be operating in 2015?
(DT) The business will be operated in interconnected webs of partnerships – like supply chain, but across all business relationships.
The interview was carried out by Toya Bahadur Karki student of Limkokwing University of Creative Technology.