The tide might finally be turning with B2B social media

I had the opportunity today to speak to members of the IABC St. Louis chapter (International Assoc of Business Communicators). The topic was how to use social media to advance business goals. I'm always amazed at the number of people in our business who don't know about, follow, or participate in social media and use the many tools available. But today was different. It seemed that most of the attendees were past the "what's a blog" stage and wanted to know how to take these tools and use them.

I had some great side conversations about what companies are doing, struggles they are coming up against, and ideas about how to use social media as an alternative. The one overwhelming feeling in the room was that businesses shouldn't get into social media just for the sake of it. It seems the tide as finally turned from every company jumping in without a strategy or understanding to pulling back and saying, "what's the real business reason we're doing this?" And that's a good thing.