Yesterday Chris Brogan and I strolled the Mall of America. This was the first time at the Mall of America for Brogan, who, as a father of young children, was amazed and delighted by the incredible distractions provided by the life-size roller coaster and other amusement rides at Nickelodeon Universe. To most outside of Minnesota, the closest you get to an amusement ride inside a mall is the $.25 horsey plugged in next to the candy vending machine.

Brogan is president of New Marketing Labs providing strategy and execution of social programs for Fortune 500 and major brand companies. We talked about trends in social emedia and how corporations are incorporating social media into their processes. I use the term processes here because it is inaccurate to single out a business function say marketing or customer service. Social media impacts all parts of a company, and last century’s corporate structure, today needs to bend with an increasingly social consumer base.

Pete Blackshaw of Ag Age has a post today called A Short and Personal History of Social Media, also pointed out what Brogan and I discussed which is benefit one - Social media is forcing silos and fiefdoms to work together. This is more like the way consumers view a company. When a consumer has an issue and tweets about it, the fact that XYZ company only uses Twitter as a media relations tool is a bogus response to that consumer. Smart corporations are using this “learning moment” to rethink their processes, to creating greater lines of communication to solve consumer issues, develop better products, and elevate the consumer, and their comments, within the company. This is a wonderful result at a number of levels.

Embracing this concept can be the difference between a company using social tactics, to being a social company.

Blackshaw writes

“So this is big — really big. But where is it going? Looking ahead, expect to hear much more about “enterprise social media” strategy. Good, old-fashioned customer-relationship management will take on new meaning and resonance, as we’ll quickly realize that half the game in social media will be understanding the relationship between existing business processes — service, employee training, product performance — and conversational output, and adjusting strategies and tactics accordingly.
Marketing organizations will continue to undergo dramatic transformation, as social media softens all silos, unleashes both friendly and hostile departmental and agency competition, and sets new standards of accountability thanks to the radically transparent nature of the content.”

Brogan comments in this video about the vast opportunities in 2010 which brings us to the second major benefit of social media – Opportunities with structure. What was referred to as the wild west of marketing on the internet a few short years ago is now taking a bit of shape — you know towns,(communities) trails,(measurement) sheriffs (FTC guidelines and trust agents). In some cases the shapes are similar to what we are familiar with, and it others it is a brave new world.

The familiar parts being implemented in the social world are functions like media relations, with a social twist ( Pitch Engine and Matchpoint ) and targeted audiences (community participation and sponsorship by corporations for example).

The opportunities presented by the brave new world part of this equation may be issues such as companies being more open in conversations. This may be implemented in a concept I’m pushing of an embedded corporate journalist. There are opportunities in new areas of measurement upon which individual employee and agency performance goals are established. Metrics such as number of conversations, Pass Along Readership (this is an old school print advertising concept that has morphed into today’s RT or retweets et. al), or number of uploaded photos.

Opportunities as Brogan mentions for larger agencies and companies to tap into social platforms like Live World, Awareness, PeopleBrowsr, CoTweet, Ning, and dozens of others, (if I missed you, comment, each comment I’ll donate a food item to a food shelf.) Blackwell mentions availability of social tools in his post as well.

Individuals too are finding ways to add value. In some cases it is by default where they play the role of trusted , personal technology trainer, and thought leader apart from the agency relationship. In some ways, they are seen as not being part of a larger revenue generation, project creation machine, but an independent auditor. One that can verify whether the time spent down some new social path is worth the effort.

Lastly, we have moved deeper into an economic landscape of individuals with individual profit and loss. Yes, more consultants, but this means free forming networks of talent, at times viewed as competitors, other times viewed as partners. From the perspective of companies in need of talent, the picture could not be better. The ability to form an all-star team is as close as your next tweet. Brogan’s venture launched today, The Third Tribe, touches on this a bit. The formation of a network sharing ideas, gaining examples and creating a dialogue that ultimately produces a more knowledgeable pool of talent. This is the land of opportunity and 2010 will give greater clarity and shape to what was once the fog of social media.