Cause Marketing, Collaboration, Content Marketing, Real Time Marketing

Predictions for 2015: Start Off the New Year Knowing the Future of Social

2015_Data_Scientist_Shortage

This week I moderated another Social Media Today webinar as part of their Best Thinker webinar series, this time on the topic of Predictions for 2015: Start Off the New Year Knowing the Future of Social. This webinar was sponsored by Act On Software and featured four all-stars on our panel: Jeremiah Owyang (@jowyang), the Chief Catalyst and Founder of Crowd Companies; Renee Ducre (@rducre) the Global Director of Social Business Marketing for IBM; Charlie Treadwell (@ctreadwell), the Director of Social Marketing at Symantec; and Don Bulmer (@dbulmer) the Vice President of Communication Strategy at Shell. We discussed what each person is predicting for 2015.

Here are 4 of the key take-aways:

  1. The Collaborative Economy is here – so how are you planning on adapting?  The movement is well funded with over 8 billion dollars and no signs of slowing. For comparison, popular social networks were funded with just over 5 billion dollars.
  2. Real time sales and service – Charlie made the point that delivering real-time content to sales and service enables our front lines interfacing with customers to create value by providing content that makes their jobs easier, answers the questions customers are asking, and sets Symantec up as the trusted expert in a real-world relationship.
  3. Cause Marketing will be in vogue in 2015 – Don cited several example companies (CVS comes to my mind when I think of good cause marketing). And the numbers have been growing; cause sponsorship is predicted to exceed $1.84 billion by the end of 2014.
  4. If content is king, then analytics is queen – Content marketing will continue to be “king”, and to stay competitive companies will need to become more efficient with their social analytics. NOTE: 70% of companies that have social analytics are still not using it!

To get a copy of the slides or listen to the replay please click here. You can also scan the highlights of this webinar on Twitter by reading the following Storify:

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December 5, 2014by Paul Dunay
Written by Paul Dunay
Paul Dunay is an award-winning B2B marketing expert with more than 20 years’ success in generating demand and creating awareness for leading technology, consumer products, financial services and professional services organizations. Paul is the global vice president of marketing for Maxymiser a leading web optimization firm, and author of four “Dummies” books: Facebook Marketing for Dummies (Wiley 2009), Social Media and the Contact Center for Dummies (Wiley Custom Publishing 2010), Facebook Advertising for Dummies (Wiley 2010) and Facebook Marketing for Dummies 2nd Edition (Wiley 2011). His unique approach to marketing has led to recognition of Paul as a BtoB Magazine Top 25 B2B Marketer of the Year for 2010 and 2009 and winner of the DemandGen Award for Utilizing Marketing Automation to Fuel Corporate Growth in 2008. He is also a finalist for the last six years in a row in the Marketing Excellence Awards competition of the Information Technology Services Marketing Association (ITSMA), and is a 2010 and 2005 gold award winner in Driving Demand. Buzz Marketing for Technology, Paul’s blog, has been recognized as a Top 20 Marketing Blog for 2009 and 2008, a Top Blog to Watch for 2009 and 2008, and an Advertising Age Power 150 blog in the “Daily Ranking of Marketing Blogs.” Paul has shared his marketing thought leadership as a featured speaker for the American Marketing Association, BtoB Magazine, CMO Club, MarketingProfs, Marketing Sherpa, Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG), and ITSMA. He has appeared on Fox News, and his articles have been featured in BusinessWeek, The New York Times, BtoB Magazine, MarketingProfs and MarketingSherpa. Paul holds an Executive Certificate in Strategy and Innovation from MIT’s Sloan School of Management and a bachelor’s degree in Marketing and Computer Science from Ithaca College.