Meeting Details:

Title: B2B Communities - What Works, Best Practices
Lead by: Mike Rowland, Impact Interactions
Date: 06/10/09

Meeting Minutes

Shara captured almost the entire meeting on twitter - search for #ocu2009 to see the flow.
The presentation by Mike Rowland of Impact Interactions has been uploaded to the wiki. Should you have any questions or wish to discuss, please contact Mike at MRowland@ImpactInteractions.com or by phone at 410-604-3304

Here are my notes from Twitter (Shara Karasic @sharakarasic):

Company: Impact Interactions, social media for business

Blog: http://impactinteractions.com/blog

Twitter: @mikerowland602

Key takeaways:

• You can't apply B2C practices to B2B communities. Tie your efforts to clearly defined objectives - business results, not traffic results.
• Mike doubts the community manager's myth of 90-9-1 participation ratio. In B2B space, blog metrics have a ratio closer to 99-.9-.1. In support communities where people can ask a quick question, the 9% expands. In Impact Interactions' experience with B2B communities, the participation results are all over the map. And those participation numbers don't account for declines in participation as members age.
• B2B communities are very different than B2C in terms of function, objectives, members, and participation.
• "B2B communities should have higher participation levels because members come to find information and build relationships with the company offering the community. If they find what they want, they return."
• A good way to bring social elements into a B2B community without being too personal is to elevate not only a person, but also their company.
• Promotion-->Conversion-->Lead in CRM.
• Usage-->Member Response-->Cost Avoidance
• Don't confuse traffic and behavior with value. Value = revenue, leads, lower support costs, awareness, purchases, insight.
• Pass the skeptic test by being realistic - economics are important. Soft value propositions = soft budget.
• Speed and time are of essence in reaching business decision makers. Higher level execs want to interact with peers only.
• In a B2B community, lack of company involvement decreases ROI. Strong company participation = higher brand loyalty, customer satisfaction. Company involvement is expected in B2B community as opposed to B2C - where company involvement may be frowned upon. In B2B community, you as host must participate a lot (as an information provider).
• Senior executives use communities to get case studies - they delegate information gathering to lower-level employees.
• B2B survey research from multiple client communities: 60+% of members are influenced to buy based on something they read or saw in the community.
• B2B survey research from multiple client communities: 35-40% of B2B community visitors gather information for purchasing decisions.
• "Not all value is economic value - there is value in customer service satisfaction. It's not always ROI."
• Work data from CRM and community database to find economic value.
• "Don't start a community just because others are doing it. It will not revolutionize the way business is done."
• Execs want results - so get your reporting in shape before launch. Detailed enough, avoid overload. Executive summary should be focused on value insight into why community is performing or not.
• Cisco NetPro community - slow growth in 2000. Now, growth curve is only slight faster. If you expect to get 20-30,000 users among 600,000 customers, could take 12-18 months at least.
• Don't give overly optimistic projections - expect cost overruns for tools, services, development
• 3 measurement categories - traffic, behavior within the community, value - what did we gain by offering the community?
• For B2B communities, don't lead with qualitative insights.
• If you are going after business decision makers, they want success stories.
• For B2B communities, criticism of brand is always an issue, Know the resources required.
• When talking to top-level management, talk about business objectives, not touchy-feely stuff.
• Large enterprises should use Twitter/Facebook to send traffic to specific landing pages. Give them a call to action. Measure B2B referrals from each third party application (your clicks)
• Don't ever use email list to executives. If not opt-in, they will have their admin assistant call your CEO.
• Focus B2B community efforts and resources on key drivers of economic value for your organization.
• Most BDM's don't participate in forums due to time constraints. No shiny tools for their own sake. Have to make sense for goals.
• Don't be all things to all people in your community. C-level, BDMs, upper level influencers want to engage with peers
• If you are going after business decision makers, they want success stories. Make it easy for them to find what they want. Speed and time are of essence.
• In young B2B communities, you need to work to build relationships. Your ratio of activity needs to be higher at first. No, it doesn't scale
• In low involvement B2B communities such as Q & A, you need a team to start with. 2-10 depending on breadth, activity.
• Re: marketing in B2B communities. Higher expectations than B2C. Expect a professional environment. But, they expect to be marketed to (some marketing is okay - but providing info, not hard sell).