Social media managements system analysis and comparison

Social media research company Altimeter has released a new report authored by Jeremiah Owyang that provides a good overview of social media management systems.

As the use of social media grows within companies and large organisations there is a need to be able to coordinate the management of a wide range of accounts with potentially multiple identities across several different social media and social network platforms. This helps companies to deal with issues such as governance and social media policies, as well as manage workflow across the multiple people within the organisation that might be using the accounts. Social media management system also have the potential of providing improved intelligence and analysis, as well as offering integration into other enterprise wide systems such as CRM.

It’s worth reading the full report, but in the meantime I’ve pulled out some of the most interesting points that I spotted on my first read through.

Altimeter Group’s research found that:

‘companies have a whopping 178 discrete social media accounts in their global corporation’

In my personal experience of counselling global companies this proliferation of accounts is a particular problem for international organisations where even when social media policies are in place you find that they frequently are not followed or implemented correctly. In other organisations it is simply that they don’t even have policies or governance in place, or if they do it is one that is inadequate or inappropriate.

Another issue is that this is still a very immature market for the social media management systems, the in-house staff that use them and even the agencies and consultancies that advise them although it is in the latter category where most expertise is usually to be found. The Altimeter reports highlights the fact that most social media management are software and technical solutions with only five having a strong focus on service which is why