Do NOT leave it to your account managers and sales reps to develop content to share – This is a biggie. We see best practitioners providing their sales force with the messages and other content to share already baked and ready to be pasted into an individual rep’s social media stream(s). Social media isn’t new. What is new, however, is how high performing sales people are using social media to engage potential or existing customers. Shut out from “traditional” sales engagement techniques, our best reps are turning to social media to get their foot in the door. Doubtful. MORE >>

Out of all the variables they tested, it came down to three key drivers: I want to focus on the first of the three – balancing scalable and personalized content.  I came across a whitepaper from CareerBuilder the other day, which stated that U.S. and U.K. employees cost businesses an estimated $37 billion every year because they do not fully understand their jobs, according to IDC. ” Effective onboarding helps workers understand their roles and the company they work for, thereby significantly cutting these losses. Why not do the same for new hire onboarding?  MORE >>

The company support helps reduce the time reps would need to figure things out or find interesting and relevant content, and Marketing ensures that the messages are appropriate and support company goals. (This is the third post in our series on sales organizations’ emerging use of social media as a channel for shaping demand.) . Although many people agree that social media can be an incredibly helpful tool for sales prospecting and due diligence, the question we hear over and over is “But is it scalable? We know that high performers can do it, but we are worried about the rest.”. MORE >>

Start with Confidence, Purpose & Content. (This is a guest post by Dana Clifford of the Communications Executive Council , our sister program for communications professionals.). They may be experts at setting strategy and managing an organization, but unfortunately not all CEOs can walk up to a podium with confidence and truly engage their employees, investors, or audience.  How about your CFO? Are they able to give a presentation that captures and keeps the audiences’ attention and teaches them something? Below are  10 of the top tips from CEB’s masters of effective presentations. MORE >>

IBM uses a deliberate process to establish reps as knowledgeable members of their community, linked to thought-leaders, delivering relevant content to their network that transcends their particular offering. Over time some reps become more involved in the process, following SMEs within IBM and externally to create their own content. IBM avoids the issue of spam through discrete customer audiences and careful choice of 3 rd party content. We recently had the pleasure of welcoming Doug Hannan and Ed Linde II from IBM to discuss in more detail their social engagement strategy. MORE >>