Can social media affect non consumer brands ?

B2B Social Media Marketing

I recently stumbled upon the Facebook group "I hate Siebel".  Siebel is a CRM system by Oracle, in which each implementation includes thousands of users and  got me thinking about how social media can affect B2B marketing.

The most cited examples I have heard about businesses leveraging social media for strengthening their brands are Dell and Comcast . Both of these examples are B2C and dealt with fixing the mistakes of “brand bashing” on the internet.

Here is a case in which the regular Jane or Joe, comes home from work and gripes about work. Namely, the computer application that is central to getting that work done, all the while simplifying it. Or so, the decision makers in the company were told, when purchasing the application from the big strong branded company.

non consumer brands in social media

These people are not only talking to their real life friends. They are talking to their network of friends. Taking this one step further, they seek to commiserate with people that know what they are going through first hand. Enter the Facebook page.

The regular person, an end-user rather than a decision maker, whose voice would typically not be heard, can have a real effect on brand image. Maybe even a CTO somewhere, in a decision process, would hear of this and decide against the brand discussed.

Have the titans, living in the ivory tower of branding, become touchable?

I came to SEO, through natural development. I guess you can say that I grew into it, since I've been developing the internet since the early win3.1.

In my opinion the proliferation of the internet in the past years as a result of broadband, cellular and cable access created a new type or rather rhythm of communication between people.

We spend less time staring passively at a TV that is loaded with commercials. Instead, we find ourselves spending more and more time searching the web for niches that suit our interests and to social medialize.

People are spending more time on the internet and less in the front of the TV.

But, there are still products to sell… and since the population has shifted from an active screen to an inter-active one, the rules have changed. Less and less people are taking the dusty road, there is a new highway,

SEO and social media marketing is the new advertizing agency.

The punchline is in the end.