A conceptual stages-of-growth model for managing a social media business profile
und | 28. Sept. 2017
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Article Category: Research Article
Online veröffentlicht: 28. Sept. 2017
Seitenbereich: 78 - 98
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/ijm-2017-0015
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© 2017 Aidan Duane, Philip O’Reilly
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.
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Dominant problems with organisational use of social media
| Dominant Problems with Social Media | |
|---|---|
| Lack of an appropriate social media strategy. | Bandwidth issues, especially due to VoD. |
| Lack of funding or resources. | Lack of control over content. |
| Duplication due to lack of coordination and direction across multiple social media platforms. | Negative comments, reviews, and feedback from internal and external detractors. |
| Disconnect from business functions and processes. | Brand hi-jacking or cyber-squatting. |
| Increase in viruses/malware attacks. | Lack of senior management support and commitment. |
| Failure to listen to/involve stakeholders especially through crowdsourcing, ideation and co-creation. | Failure to appoint an individual/group to manage and coordinate social media. |
| Lack of appropriate security controls and polices. | Lack of understanding of social media. |
| Incongruity, ambiguity or uncertainty over social media objectives. | Business social intelligence failures in translating social media data into strategy. |
| Failure to create and enforce formal social media usage policies. | Failure to establish metrics to measure social media ROI. |
| Employee misuse/abuse. | Over-zealous management control of social media. |
| Failure to deliver social media training. | Exposure to lawsuits and legal action. |
Applying Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther s (2010) four key topics to the extant SoG literature
| Topics | Characteristics | |
|---|---|---|
| Number of Stages | There is a maturity curve to the adoption of any enabling technology and this evolution can be divided into a number of distinct stages of growth. | |
| 3 Stages | ||
| 4 Stages | ||
| 5 Stages | ||
| 6 Stages | ||
| 7 Stages | de Brì (2009). | |
| Paths of Evolution | Paths of evolution vary greatly as organisations: may not complete each stage; may begin in any phase; and may skip stages ( | |
| may concatenate stages ( | ||
| may select which aspects of the technology to move forward on ( | ||
| may skip stages ( | ||
| may have to complete every stage without skipping stages ( | ||
| may expand the number of stages as technological advances are made ( | ||
| Dominant Problems | Organisations may experience different dominant problems at each stage including: increasing costs as the technology and complexity increase progressively during the latter phases of implementation ( | |
| the structure and level of management can insufficient ( | ||
| a failure to adapt to the pace of rapid growth ( | ||
| a failure to manage negativity and critical comments ( | ||
| a failure to adequately control the system ( | ||
| Benchmark Variables | Different technologies are in different stages, requiring different management strategies ( | |
| five factors: task; objective; direction/involvement; methodological emphasis; planning context ( | ||
| six key indicators: description; architecture; people and processes; value added; cost drivers; limitations ( | ||
| nine benchmark variables: data; architecture; stability of production environment; warehouse staff; users of warehouse; impact on users’ skills and jobs; use of warehouse ; organisational impacts; costs and benefits ( | ||
| five growth types: strategy/objectives; focus; structure; management involvement; technology types/applications ( | ||
| six domains: strategic alignment; governance; methods; IT; people; culture ( | ||
| six critical success factors: experience; resources; process; measurement; commitment; culture ( | ||
A suggested stage model for managing a social media business profile (SMBP)
| Stage | Strategy | Focus | Structure | Management |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Experimentation and Learning | It is experimental with every department doing their own thing. | Announcing launch of SMBP, posting a number of comments, images and videos, and providing some product/ service information. | Individual or departmental drive. | None or very little involvement. |
| 2. Rapid Growth | It is coordinated across all departments by management, and a number of goals and objectives have been established. | Consumer-centric focus. Efforts aimed at increasing internal and external awareness. Customers are encouraged to connect, follow, like, recommend, and comment, on products and its services. | Bottom-up widespread user participation coupled with top-down management. | Support and Encourage. |
| 3. Formalisation | It is formalised and controlled across the company, with a strategy aligned with the business plan. Staff adhere to an established set of rules. | Planning, strategy, governance, and alignment with overall business strategy. | A more centralised corporate driven model to coordinate efforts. | Controlled by management. |
| 4. Consolidation and Integration | It is very well integrated with key business processes across the company, and it is driving a fundamental change in how we do business. | Optimisation of processes and creating scale. Fundamental business change. Pursue alignment with external partners/suppliers. Cocreation / ideation, crowdsourcing emerge. | Extension of corporate model to integrate external partners, suppliers, customers, communities, experts, etc. Micro-outsourcing of activities may also occur. | Shared by management / staff. |
| 5. Institutional Absorption | It is embedded into the core of what we do, and how we do it, from customers to suppliers, from internal partners to external partners. | De-facto application for key business tasks. Enterprise-wide social media technologies for the entire workforce Generate new/reengineer existing business models. | Aimed at customers, suppliers and partners, as business connectivity is transformed to establish wider business relationships. | Shared by management / staff or decentralised. |
The conceptual stage model for SMBP implementation and management
| Stages of Growth | Paths of Evolution | Strategy | Focus | Structure | Management | Dominant Problem |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stage 0: Exploration | The path of evolution reguires individuals to progress from personal use to exploring social media for business use. | Individuals in the organisation experiment with social media for personal use and research its possible application for business use. ROI may need to be established before adoption occurs. | Focused on personal use initially, and later on researching use in a business context. | Personal | None | Lack of time. |
| Lack of skills and expertise. | ||||||
| Lack of clear metrics for ROI. | ||||||
| Lack of budget. | ||||||
| Lack of understanding. | ||||||
| Lack of staff. | ||||||
| Stage 1: Experimentation and Learning | The path of evolution reguires departmental champions to drive the use of the SMBP as a business information system. | Social media adoption is experimental with every department doing their own thing. There is little management involvement. | The top five uses at this stage relate to marketing, information sharing, advertising, PR, and communication. | Individual or marketing department or outsourced | None or very little involvement. | Lack of time |
| Lack of skills and expertise. | ||||||
| Lack of understanding | ||||||
| Lack of staff. | ||||||
| Lack of budget. | ||||||
| Difficulty in growing the audience | ||||||
| Stage 2: Direction and Coordination | The path of evolution stems from a recognition that there is a lack of planning and a clear strategy for the SMBR | Social media adoption increases as management provide greater direction and coordination of efforts across all departments. A number of goals and objectives are established. | Increasing brand awareness and driving sales are two primary stated objectives. Use still relates to marketing, information sharing, advertising, PR, and communication but some customer feedback may be collected/analysed. | Coordinated model at department level | Management provide direction and coordinate efforts | Lack of time |
| Lack of skills and expertise. | ||||||
| Lack of understanding | ||||||
| Lack of staff. | ||||||
| Lack of clear metrics for ROI. | ||||||
| Lack of budget. | ||||||
| Stage 3: Formalisation | The path of evolution arises through a need to look for opportunities to integrate the SMBP with existing systems and business processes. | Social media becomes more formalised and a clear strategy is developed, but further investment/deployment of resources is based on establishing clear metrics for ROI. | The importance of customer feedback and analysis comes to the fore as a drive to improve metrics for ROI is prioritised. | Coordinated at business level | Management establish metrics for ROI and allocate resources | Lack of clear metrics for ROI. |
| Difficulty in growing the audience. | ||||||
| Lack of understanding | ||||||
| Lack of time | ||||||
| Difficulty managing user experience. | ||||||
| Insufficient contributors | ||||||
| Stage 4: Consolidation and Integration | The path of evolution can take a number of avenues. Firstly, management may decide that no further integration is warranted, and instead consolidate existing stages. Secondly, management may decide to integrate social media apps with internal systems and business processes. Thirdly, as new social media apps emerge, management may decide to pursue greater integration with the external value chain. | Social media becomes better integrated with key business processes and begins to drive a fundamental change in how business is done. | Social media surpasses its use as a marketing and PR tool, transforming to engage established customers in the co-creation of new products and services. Use is also expanded to source partners and suppliers, support project management, and engage in R&D. Crowdsourcing, crowdfunding, and user generated content (UGC) also emerge, while HR use social media to identify skilled individuals. Social media also becomes embedded in the organisations website. | Coordinated at business level | Difficulty in positively engaging the audience. | |
| Lack of clear metrics for ROI. | ||||||
| Difficulty in growing the audience. | ||||||
| Lack of time. | ||||||
| Lack of management support. | ||||||
| Lack of understanding | ||||||
| Stage 5: Institutional Absorption | Lessons have been learned and management does not allow hype about new social media applications cloud their judgment. Management has a broader perspective, retaining that which is good in existing social media applications, and embracing new applications as appropriate. | Insufficient evidence | Insufficient evidence | Insufficient evidence | Insufficient evidence | Insufficient evidence |