Social technology is not to be confused with social media. While the press strongly touts it, I strongly believe that there is more to it than just an "F-word" - Facebook. I believe that it can be the redefinition of networks, a new way of defining demand processes from the outside-in, offering new possibilities to listen and have dialogue with the customer's customer, and to sense market changes with less latency. It is about a new type of technology: networks that can connect the social graph with personalized interests to actively communicate with micro-segments of the market. It is about dialogue. The definition of the network is fundamentally different in reach than e-commerce. It provides a unique opportunity to forge relationships and influence buying behaviors based on friends of friends. Think about what is possible .... We have never had the ability to listen in near-real time. Supply chain networks have never been based on relationships. Instead, we have depended on order-to-cash transactions fraught with days and weeks of latency. How we could redefine supply chains if we had technologies that could operate in a different context based on relationships with near-zero latency of information!
