Every now and then, I get asked by a perspective customer for a sandbox to try out a “community”. See, this is a typically offering from a technology or software company. They want to be able to play around in the sandbox. My memories of a sandbox stem back to Kindergarten. You know … the place we all learned to “SHARE”? These things you would think would go together.
Sharing |Sandboxes | Kindergarten.
Sadly, in the community space, sandboxes aren’t really beneficial. You see, the mistake is routed in the perspective that it is a technology purchase.
In essence, there is truth in that concept. You are purchasing social technology. However, it is really a business service that is enabled by technology. How can you assess the viability of a technology that is to engage your brand with a targeted audience without the audience? Compare this to a play. Every final dress rehearsal typically has an audience. Movies are prescreened for an audience to get a reaction. It is the same way for a successful community strategy and deployment. Social Technology without the members/fans/customers is flat. It is simply a set without the actors.
Please Please think first about your goals and strategy and then apply technology to achieve them. In other words, get your script right! For enterprises that are being cautious like this, I would first suggest doing a “pilot community” rather than a sandbox. In the theater world, this is called playing to Peoria. Develop your roadmap with a soft launch to a specific audience. This may be for a particular grouping of customers, partners, or around a particular product or service. Learn your lessons here and then expand across your enterprise as the roadmap. Make sure you choose your pilot audience carefully. It must be a big enough group to foster INteraction and attention. You require a valid business reason for them to care to INgage with you on a regular basis. Many times these groups will self identify as requesting a social application to communicate with each other.
Choose a technology partner that will scale with your success. Another pit fall I see enterprises that are tip toeing around a social INgagement strategy make is choosing a technology that doesn’t scale. Once they want to scale … they pay double to convert the existing content on to a more enterprise clad platform.
So are you ready to play to Peoria? I am interested to understand what baby steps your enterprise has discussed in developing a successful (or not) social technology.
