• Companies are pretty good at predicting costs
• and they’re not very good at predicting demand.

If they were, companies like Ford, Coca-Cola and Columbia Pictures never would have released the Edsel, New Coke, or Ishtar.

The problem is that until recently, the financial success of a project was determined posteriori (after the fact), by how much revenue was generated. But wouldn’t it be better if we could actually predict the project’s financial success a priori (before the fact?) Recent advances in “social” technologies have resulted in a new sort of crystal ball that can not only predict marketplace viability accurately, but can also establish the holy grail of marketing: value-based pricing.

A New Way

Imagine for a moment that you have an idea for a great new product. You know how much that product will cost to develop and manufacture, but don’t yet have a good feeling on how well the marketplace will respond to it. Sound familiar? So how do you determine whether or not to continue with the project? Product testing? Focus groups? Surveys? And even after performing all of these expensive pseudo-scientific actions, doesn’t the decision still come down to a gut-feel based on “intangibles?”

But, what if, instead of surveys or gut-feelings, we had a way to know exactly how many people would prepay for your product? And what if, those same customers would also determine an average selling price (ASP) for the product too?

Fantasy? Nope. Just another business innovation that is resulting from our experimentation with social technologies.

Musician Julia Nunes explains.

“Normally I’d record the album and incur a fun amount of debt, and then, I would try to make that money back by selling the album,” she says in her Kickstarter project video where she’s requesting $15,000 to fund her project. “But now we have this awesome platform called Kickstarter, and I can basically pre-sell the album, and offer up a bunch of stuff that I’d never sell on my regular website, with the added bonus of you guys knowing exactly where your money is going…directly into the studio.”

Had Julia decided to follow the traditional business decision cycle, she’d have to consider investing $15,000 of her own (or borrowed) money to record, manufacture, market, and distribute her album. If she assumed an ASP for each album at $9.99 on iTunes, she’d need to sell well over 1,500 of them (to also cover sales costs) just to break even. If that number passed her gut-check, she’d probably green-light the project.

However Kickstarter opened a new way for Julia to assess the financial viability of her project. Having already calculated the $15,000 that would make the project worth her while, she didn’t have to wait to determine the financial success of her project posteriori, instead the marketplace determined that for her a priori, as 1,685 people prepaid $77,888 for her to create her album.

Business Ramifications

Many people look at Kickstarter as a cute way for the little guy to make it. And they’re missing the point. Something much bigger is happening here as networked technologies are squeezing inefficiencies out of traditional business decision-making processes. The concept of network funding has applicability in any business, not just musicians, as indicated by the 5,258 people who gave $364,000 to Peter Dering to manufacture his Camera Clip System, or the 12,521 folks who gave $1.464M to Casey Hopkins to manufacture his Elevation Dock: The Best Dock for the iPhone.

The business ramifications of network-based funding run even deeper. Consider the fact that companies are never quite certain that they’ve optimized the price-to-demand ratio to generate the most revenue. Companies spend many hours trying to determine pricing, constantly “guesstimating” the consequences of setting prices high to establish a perceived value, or “diving the boat” to drive revenue through volume. Either way, the uncertainty frequently leaves companies with a nagging suspicion that they’ve left money on the table.

Yet, Julia Nunes established a value-based selling price for her album a priori to recording its first note. The ASP for her album was $46.22 [($77,888/1,685), with a median of $30 (determined by the breakdown of backers provided by Kickstarter]. Without a service like Kickstarter, had Julia gone to a record publisher and said, “I can sell exactly 1,685 albums at an ASP of $46.22,” she would have been laughed out of the building, because even the best A&R person in the world can’t predict sales with that level of accuracy. However, Julia’s prediction wasn’t based on the squishiness of a gut-feel; it was based on fact.

So, what does this mean for your business?

The more we use our social networks, the more we learn about their value. As we learn, new uses will emerge, such as helping businesses assess risk in a way that was impossible to do just a few years ago. Services like Kickstarter offer producers the ability to see exactly what consumers are willing to commit to their credit cards before getting too deep into the product development cycle.

So, I have a question. Is your company actively considering the power of networks in their business, or has it already dismissed them as minor tools to be placed into the hands of corporate communicators?

Note: If you’d like to read the full story behind Julia Nune’s successful use of social media technologies, please feel free to get your free copy of The Rule of Thumbs.

I went online to learn that the building that I saw represented their new corporate headquarters. I learned that they were growing, having acquired twelve additional semiconductor companies over the past three years–who each brought some pretty cool technologies with them. After a few more mouse-clicks, I also noticed that the company had a very small social media presence. Thinking that this might be Kismet (like how many analog/mixed signal companies with cool new technologies yet very little social media presence can I expect to move into the area?), I decided to write a report, on spec, complete with specific recommendations on how the company might use its online properties to better communicate with its customers–electrical engineers.

I wrote the report and snail-mailed a hardcopy to a Microsemi contact with whom I’d been introduced through a mutual colleague. Unfortunately, it wasn’t meant to be. No complaints. Such are the risks of spec research.

However, as I shared the report with a few friends, it occurred to me that independent of the subject-company’s name on the report, the document contained relevant information for any high-tech, B2B company who is considering the use of online publishing platforms. So, rather than having this report remain lost forever on my hard-drive, I decided to share it with my readers.

If you work for a B2B company in a high-tech industry, you should read this report: Microsemi Corporation: Online Properties Analysis and Recommendations. Perhaps it’ll help provide a new perspective by which to evaluate your own online properties.

The secret to understanding Twitter resides within its constraints. By understanding how to use brevity and timeliness as an advantage, companies can use Twitter as a lead generation machine. Take the following example:

At 11:44 a.m. on September 12th, Twitter user, @suburbanmama (Marcie Taylor), published the following post:

“Also right now I am evaluating #socialmedia analytics tools. Any suggestions? #smmoc @hubspot @radian6 @lithium”

From a business perspective, this tweet represents a prospect reaching out to her public network for opinions. For those not used to Twitter shorthand, let’s parse the tweet:

“Also right now I am evaluating #socialmedia analytics tools.”

Marcie has told her 3200 followers that she is looking to evaluate tools that track conversations in social mediums.

Her use of two hashtags (#socialmedia & #smmoc) aid those who are tracking specific Twitter conversations. For example, by tagging her post with “#smmoc,” she’s seeking the attention of a local social media support group called Social Media Masterminds of Orange County.

Finally, she’s called-out three of the top social media analytics companies through their Twitter handles: Hubspot, Radian6, and Lithium.

Marcie posted her question at 11:44 a.m.

Radian6 responded within seven minutes.

@suburbanmama Happy to help where we can. =)

But Radian6 wasn’t the first analytics company to respond. A competitor called ViralHeat had already responded five minutes earlier:

@suburbanmama Have you considered @viralheat as an analytics tool as well? Take a look & let me know if you have any Qs! #socialmedia #smmoc

(Note the use of her hashtags #socialmedia and #smmoc)

Twitter is a simple platform that allows direct correspondence between companies and their prospects. Marcie reached out to her followers via Twitter. Radian6 responded directly to her. Seeing an opportunity to add its name onto an exclusive list, Viral Heat also responded. Both use Twitter as a strategic sales tool.

Is your company monitoring and responding to prospects who are asking about your products and services? If not, consider the fact that your competition may be responding for you.

In the past, SDGE’s crisis-communications options would have been limited to press releases and press conferences. And although those activities still occurred, SDGE had another option available to it–one that would allow it to speak directly to its customers in real-time. Specifically, the company used its Twitter account to publish 107 messages between 3:52 p.m on Thursday and 9:17 a.m. on Friday.

This mini-case study looks at how SDGE used Twitter to communicate through the crisis, and then it offers some lessons that other companies can learn from the event.

Setting the Foundation

Although San Diego Gas & Electric created its Twitter account (@sdge) on April 24, 2009, it didn’t start posting to it until the following September. During its first twenty-four months of tweeting, the company grew its audience to over 16,000 followers by sharing helpful tips pertaining to energy safety, conservation, and ways for customers to cut their energy bills. Examples of such tips include: changing the filter on your air conditioner, using tankless water heaters, and closing window drapes to keep the sun from heating up your house.

During these first 24 months, the company had established a fairly consistent publishing schedule, averaging 34 tweets per month (median = 31), but that would all change the day the power stopped flowing to all of its 1.4 million customers.

Lights out

SDGE’s first tweet about the event occurred at 3:52 p.m on Thursday:

• We understand power is out, we are working on the cause and solution. We do not have a restoration time yet.

During the next sixteen hours, the company published 106 more tweets containing information that fell into four different categories: updates, insights, tips, and help.

Fifty percent of the tweets included updates–real-time news such as the number of households affected (1.4 million), neighborhoods affected, and areas which were getting power back.

Insights offered customers a glimpse into the company’s thought process. For example:

• Think of the system as linked by springs, when one part goes out the rest are affected.
• SDGE prez said he has been with utility since 1971 and never seen anything like this. There was no warning. Started at 3:30.

31% of the tweets contained tips, which were split into five different sub-categories: safety, help, energy saving, coping, and preparing.

Of these 33 tips SDGE published during the crisis, 36% were devoted to safety. Such tweets included:

• Safety is key at this time. Prepare to stay home tonight without power.

• The outage has affected street lights. Please drive safely and treat street signals as four way stops.

• If you have a personal family emergency plan, please activate it now.

• If you’re using a portable generator, for safety never plug the generator into any electric outlets. cot.ag/mPEO6f #sdoutage

• Candles can be fire hazards. Never place them near curtains or other flammable material, or leave them unattended. #sdoutage

27% contained pleas for customers to help SDGE bring-up the grid.

• Remember to turn off air conditioners to prevent them from unexpectedly coming on when the power is restored. #sdoutage
• During this power outage turn major appliances off and unplug all small appliances to avoid a surge when power is restored. #sdoutage

12% contained coping strategies:

• Keep your refrigerator and your freezer doors closed to help prevent food spoilage. #sdoutage

and 9% were related to preparation for when the power would be turned on:

• To prepare for when power is restored unplug sensitive equipment like microwaves, computers and televisions. #sdoutage
• To prepare for power restoration: Leave one light on so you’ll know when the power is restored. #sdoutage

When the lights came on

During the course of the crisis, the informational needs of SDGE’s customers changed, so the company adjusted its content accordingly. For example, as power was being restored to their customers…

…it began shifting its messages from updates to tips. The following chart illustrates both the volume and type of tweets the company produced during the crisis.

Lessons from SDGE

Companies can learn a few lessons from how SDGE used Twitter:

1) Dig a well before you are thirsty

SDGE had invested twenty-four months and 825 tweets into building its Twitter channel. During that time, not only had it gathered 16,000 followers, but it had simultaneously established the channel as a credible place for corporate information. Had SDGE waited until the event before using its Twitter channel, it’s likely that the company wouldn’t have had the experience to know how to use it effectively.

2) The media follows Twitter
The media is interested in more than just press releases and press conferences. They also monitor Twitter, as evidenced by the Los Angeles Times which lead its first online article of the event with a screenshot of an SDGE tweet.

3) Create a hashtag
Within one hour of its first tweet about the event, SDGE started using the hashtag “#sdoutage.” Hashtags are useful for people to monitor all conversations about the incident, above and beyond what the company is saying about it.

4) Ask for help
Turning on a power grid is much more complicated than turning on a light-switch, and therefore, SDGE needed the cooperation of its customers to help bring the system back online. It did so by asking them for help, such as turning off appliances and spreading the message to other customers.

5) Adjust the message
During the course of the event, the informational needs of the audience changed. At the beginning of the crisis, people needed to know two things: what was happening and what the company was doing to fix the problem. Once those messages were delivered, the company switched to help customers cope until power was restored. As neighborhoods were reconnected to the grid, the company prepared them with steps to take before the lights came on. Finally, after power was fully restored, the company switched to advisories that asked customers to conserve power until network stability was achieved.

Conclusion

In all, SDGE showed how companies can use a channel limited to 140 character messages to communicate in real-time during a crisis.

Is your company prepared to do the same?

First, I assessed their online assets to determine which ones could produce the most robust dividends. Based on that analysis, I decided to approach both their Facebook Fans and blog readers by:

• creating a “Donations” tab on the Facebook page that described both the project and the goal
• adding a PayPal button in order to accept credit card donations
• adding a snail-mail address for donors who were more comfortable sending a check
• posting to the nonprofit’s Facebook wall (as administrator) letting the organization’s 1400 fans know about the project and new donations tab
• publishing a blog post about the project that included a link to the new Facebook donations tab
• and updating the list of donor’s names as they arrived.

The following is a chart illustrates what happened.

In less than nine days, total donations hit $4,575, eclipsing the organization’s $3,000 goal by 53%!

So, here’s a math question for you. Based on the following information, what’s the ROI?:

• 1400 Facebook fans
• 120 blog subscribers
• 400 unique blog visitors per month
• $30/month for a PayPal account that takes credit cards
• $0 Facebook Fan page
• $0 for donated web hosting
• 2-hours to create and publish the content
• added $3,450 of online revenue in nine days to the $1,125 that was generated offline.

Successful business folks understand that companies are complicated entities that consist of many moving parts. And although the ROI of individual projects is important, the assets that companies build over time may hold more overall significance in the grande scheme. Therefore, rather than spending time calculating ROI on a project-by-project basis, perhaps it’s more prudent to invest that same time into building your company’s online assets?

By considering new media activities as investments in the development of corporate assets, a world of opportunities open. The more valuable the asset, the larger the dividends that it produces.

Mike The Journalist

Mike Santarini spent 13-years writing for trade magazines such as EETimes and EDN before being laid off in February 2008. At first glance, his story sounds cliche–experienced journalist caught in the cross hairs of a decimated print industry–but that’s where Mike’s story takes an unexpected turn. Instead of finding a job with another struggling publication, he accepted one with an electronics company that he covered as a trade journalist. One week after his unceremonious ejection from EDN, Xilinx hired Mike to take over the manufacturer’s 21 year old publication called Xcell Journal.

Mike The Embedded Journalist

During its 21 years, Xcell Journal grew from a simple company newsletter into a quarterly “engingeering-practical” magazine with a readership of approximately 40,000. Although that circulation sounds envious, as a trade journalist, Mike understood that the quality of that number was very important and so, after a little investigating, he found that the Xcell Journal mailing list “…wasn’t being scrubbed, and it was being sent to dead mailboxes at the four corners of the earth.” After some vetting, today, the magazine has tightened its circulation to approximately 25,000 (~20K online and ~5K print).

I found it curious that, in the age of online content, Xilinx would still print hard copies of the magazine.

Mike explained that Xcell Journal is designed as a magazine that engineers can retain for reference. By printing Xcell Journal on high quality, “heavy cardboardish” stock, the print version delivers a rich reading experience.

The comment reminded me of Seth Godin’s concept that “books are souvenirs,” which Mike validated when he said, “Xcell is a treasured commodity. Engineers are known to keep a library of past issues that they use for reference.”

But if only 20% of the readership receive copies of the print version, how does Xilinx qualify these special recipients?

“Through the sales department,” Mike explained. “It’s a great model because we’re getting ROI on the print versions and getting them into the hands of our customers/potential customers.”

Journalist vs. Embedded Journalist

Moving from traditional journalist to embedded journalist has been educational. “There’s a lot of stuff I didn’t know about the company,” he said. “I now have respect for the humongous effort it takes to get a chip conceived, roadmapped, designed and brought to market.” This revelation surprised him because, as a journalist who covered Xilinx, he expected to know more.  However, by being embedded within a company, Mike had access to stories that he never could have as an external journalist.

Embedded Journalism as a Career

I asked Mike if he would recommend this line of work for other journalists.

“Yes. Right now there are lots of opportunities for good journalism in industries.” He also added a few caveats.

“You have to make sure before you take the job that the company is creating technology that you truly think is innovative. I got lucky because I joined a company that invented the FPGA and is the leader in the biz and has a very bright future. I’m not sure if I was in a position where I had to promote a third-place me-too technology and constantly perfume the pig that I’d take the job. I think there are a lot of great technologies and companies out there and thus a lot of great opportunities out there for embedded journalists. There are a ton of great stories that aren’t getting told and sometimes companies don’t realize they have a great story or realize it isn’t being told to the outside world.”

A New World

At the end of the phone call, I asked Mike if his experience as an embedded journalist has been favorable. “Yes,” he answered, before adding something more interesting.

“In a way, I can’t go back because of it.”

Photos Courtesy of Xilinx

“Last year our paper statements consumed 190 trees.”

The sentence sounded familiar to me, so I performed a search of my email for the term “190 trees.”  Thirteen instances were revealed, with the oldest being sent to me on December 13, 2008.

As I dug into each email, I saw that the same sentence had been repeated in all of the emails that were sent in 2008, 2009, and 2010:

“Last year our paper statements consumed 190 trees.”

I found it hard to believe that The Toll Roads consumed exactly 190 trees annually over the past three years, but what else could I conclude? Here are three possibilities:

1. The email marketing campaign is a complete failure because the Toll Roads hasn’t put a dent in their annual tree consumption rate.
2. The campaign is a total success because the Toll Roads converted all new customers to paperless statements, thus maintaining the 190 tree per year consumption rate.
3. The company is simply cutting and pasting the same email independently of how many trees are being consumed on an annual basis.

I still don’t know which one it is. I requested a clarification from The Toll Roads two days ago and am waiting for a response. But in the mean time, as an executive, you need to understand that everything your organization publishes becomes part of a database that can be mined. It doesn’t matter if it comes from marketing, PR, or sales–to your customer, it only comes from one place…your company.

So, is your company sending mixed messages to its customers?

I always recommend that companies consider the risks associated with building their entire social media strategies on rented land. The problem with relying so heavily on third party platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter is that your company’s online reputation is at the whim of their terms of service (TOS)—terms that free platform services reserve the right to change at any moment!

Recently, I’ve observed two incidents that have highlighted a problem that affects every company who uses a Facebook Fan Page. The problem manifests itself in a conflict that occurs between Facebook’s TOS and a known “bug.”

Here’s the problem.

1) Section 4 of Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities stipulate that:

• You will not provide any false personal information on Facebook, or create an account for anyone other than yourself without permission.
• You will not create more than one personal profile.

2) The Facebook Pages Terms clearly spell out:

• You may only administer a Facebook Page if you are an authorized representative of the subject of the Page.

3) Facebook’s Bugs and Known Issues pages state that the original admin of a page cannot be removed.

These three issues conspire to create not only a conundrum for corporate entities that outlive the duration of the relationship with the page’s creator, but for the page creators themselves. Any relationship change, such in employment status or expired contract causes two outcomes instantaneously:

• A corporate risk that a non-corporate sanctioned user still has admin privileges.
• A violation of Facebook’s Terms of Service for the original creator.

So, what can your company to do? The options aren’t pretty.

I have no idea how easy or hard it is for Facebook to fix the “bug,” but if the original page creators were allowed to transfer admin responsibility completely, this problem becomes moot. Until then, however, every company that uses a Facebook Page will eventually be forced to either violate Facebook’s Terms of Service or accept the risk of a non-corporate-controlled person having a key to the family jewels.

Bryan Elliott

I watched Bryan Elliott enter the coffee shop where we’d agreed to meet for an interview.  From across the room, he looked like a carefree young surfer dude, but as he got closer, two things became apparent: Bryan wasn’t a kid and there was nothing carefree about him. In front of me sat a man who simultaneously knew exactly who he was and who cared deeply about his mission.

He didn’t always have such confidence, though. In late 2008, this veteran of the $150 billion Action Sports industry with a resume containing employers such as Disney and Yamaha found himself unemployed. And he began to panic.

He wondered who he could turn to. He wished he had a safety net.  And that got him to thinking.

A net.  A network. Social networking. He wondered if he could build a professional network that could catch other members if they fell.

Building a Network

In September 2008, Bryan formed the SoCal Action Sports Network, an invite/referral-only network of people who were dedicated to the Action Sports industry. The group began having monthly meetings and although the numbers were growing, Bryan made a humbling discovery.

“It was growing, but I was screwing it up with shameless self promotion.”

Bryan came to the realization that the group was much bigger than him. He wanted the network to be something different. He thought of words such as “relevant,” “connected,” “community,”  “loyalty,” and “trust.” He wanted to build a community that put  “…self promotion in the back seat and generosity in the front seat.”

It was from this realization that he penned the following mantra:

While there is strength in numbers, we don’t measure value by how many members we have. We’re not keeping score of our popularity or adding hundreds of new ‘friends’ we may never know. We’re interested in people who understand that the real value of connecting is when it translates into meaningful relationships of trust. Where members help each other, form a community and prosper. A place where innovation, creativity and collaboration thrive. And self-promotion takes a back seat to generosity.

Bryan found an unfortunate side effect to the exclusive nature of the SoCal Action Sports Network–the fact that he was turning away very talented people who just didn’t meet the stringent requirements of the group. Instead of ignoring them, he recognized an opportunity for a second network. Called Linked Orange County, membership required applicants to be a part of the Orange County business community.

Lastly, Bryan’s interaction with the SoCal Action Sports Network also helped him identify a third need. Members were always looking for young people, either to hire as interns, employees, or even for focus groups. He envisioned a network of college students who were interested in Action Sports careers. If formed, such a network could be very powerful. For example, if a company was looking for a focus group, the network could be called upon. If a company needed a group of students to distribute fliers to 100,000 people on Huntington Beach, the students could be assembled at the touch of a button. And so he formed the SoCal Action Sports University, another exclusive organization that required its members to be enrolled in a SoCal undergraduate or graduate schools.

Today, just eighteen months later, Bryan’s triple-threat-community consists of three networks: SoCal Action Sports Network (~2500 LinkedIn members), LinkedOC (~2900 LinkedIn members) and SoCal Action Sports University (~250 Facebook Fans).

January 2010: Opportunity Knocks

When Bryan Elliott had the opportunity to secure Seth Godin, his favorite author, to speak at one of his events, he felt excited…and scared. All opportunities come with risks, and this one came with two: a nonrefundable deposit (to hold the Feb 11th date) and a minimum financial commitment level that would require the sale of at least 400 tickets.

Bryan now had the opportunity to put his money where his mouth was. He’d set out to build a concentrated network of communities, ones that cared more about results than raw membership numbers. And so, after convincing his wife to let him use personal funds to save the date, he turned to his network for help.

On January 12th, he sent a message to his three networks. He explained that if members could purchase enough tickets by January 25th (note…that’s just 13 days!), the community could host Seth Godin on February 11th.

Four days later, he sent another message. “We’ve sold 254 seats as of Jan. 16 at 10am, that’s more than 50% of our goal! We have until Jan. 25 to make it.”

Finally, on January 25th, he announced a success. “We did it! The Feb. 11 Event is on…”

Audience is an Asset

Let’s take a step back and look at this accomplishment. On January 11th, no Seth Godin event existed. No tickets ($49 regular, $25 student) had been sold. Yet on January 25th, not only had the trigger number been reached, but the actual number of tickets sold exceeded expectations so much that a larger venue needed to be secured. In thirteen days, Bryan Elliott had sold enough tickets to fund a massive and ultimately successful event. And finally, consider this: he did so without purchasing a single advertisement nor peddling a single press release.

Instead, he did something radical. He asked his community to purchase a ticket based solely on trust. 837 people took him up on his request. Would your audience to the same for you?

Photo Credit: Chis Lorenz

Tags: Seth Godin Bryan Elliott SoCal Action Sports Network Linked Orange County SoCal Action Sports University Audience is an Asset ron ploof orange county social media social networking

Yesterday, I stumbled upon yet another sad example to prove my point. For the seventh day in a row, I had been notified that “Scott Morris” was following me on Twitter:

The picture above indicates one of two things: either “Scott” suffers from TIFS (twitchy index finger syndrome) or he’s using an automated bot to scam-up his follower count–a strategy commonly used by pornographers and Viagra dealers.

But “Scott’s” profile didn’t contain the sleaziness I was expecting. Instead, it contained a link to a SoCal-based online medical community. Something just didn’t add up.

That’s when it hit me. Had I just found yet another example of a corporate social media strategy left in the hands of an intern or a drunk at the party? So, I called the company to find out.

My call went immediately to voicemail, so I left a message, asking Scott Morris to return my call.  A few minutes later, the president of the company, a physician, called instead.

“Thank you for calling,” I said, “but I was looking for Scott Morris.”

The doctor explained that he didn’t know a Scott Morris.

“Well, someone by that name is Twittering on your company’s behalf,” I said.

“I don’t know how to use Twitter,” he admitted, explaining that someone else does it for him. He then began asking questions about his company’s Twitter activities. As I explained my suspicions, I could hear the concern in his voice.  He thanked me for bringing the matter to his attention and promised to look into it.

About a half hour later, he called with an update.

“I checked and discovered that one of my marketing people was doing this. I told them to stop.” He also decided to take over the twittering from now on–a decision that I applauded him for.

The lesson of this story cannot be understated. When it comes to corporate reputations, Social Media channels are quickly becoming more powerful than traditional media. Until C-levels understand the true impact of social media responsibilities, they’ll continue to blindly put their online reputation into the hands of the unprepared.

Tags: Ron Ploof Orange County Executive Read This First Online Reputation