“Content is king but context is God.” – this is a quote Michael Krigsman used in a blog post on ZDNet. For those of you who don’t know Michael, he is an internationally recognized analyst, strategy advisor and an authority on enterprise software leadership, CIO innovation, and social business. In full disclosure, Michael is an advisor to NextPrinciples.
Why is this post relevant to NextPrinciples?
As we announced recently, we at NextPrinciples have focused on Social Lead Management as a core use case. When discussing our plans with Michael, he pointed out that context is a key element in determining the value (and success) of Social Lead Management.
Because they are ‘real time,’ interactions on social channels supply the missing contextual information needed to convert conversations on social media to useful leads. These interactions offer a sweeping view of a potential contact, which increases engagement and connection with him or her as a buyer. Every marketer should consider how to use social interaction to segment and target micro groups with relevant and meaningful content. In theory, this is a marketing nirvana, but in practice, it’s just not that easy.
What do we need to address to get there?
There is little argument that context is the next level of refinement for content. However, for this to work, there remain challenges in both technology and process that we must address. Primarily, most organizations have created processes that work with content but have almost entirely missed the context part of this new marketing equation.
If you are like most companies, you buy an email list and ‘burn the names’ to get leads. How can you re-engineer this process to incorporate the knowledge gained from social insights? Even knowing how to start is a challenge.
NextPrinciples believes there is a better and easier way to generate leads, looking outside-in from social channels and unifying the context of interaction and the data inside CRM and marketing automation platforms. There is tremendous value to unearth by scoring and profiling these social leads based on their demographic and interaction content. It’s a new way to generate qualified leads easily and quickly.
Michael’s original post is reproduced below: