I presented some thoughts on choosing a white label social networking platform recently at Adtech Chicago and thought I'd elaborate on some of the pitch points. You can tell the focus drove deeper than product comparisons and suggested a more thorough look at the vendors themselves. How do they use their own product? How do they go to market? Who are their partners and how do they play off one another to create value?
What's The Platform's Sweet Spot?
Does the vendor's strength play unevenly towards certain elements of social computing. In other words, did they start out as a blog provider and magically reinvent themselves as as a platform play?Can They Play Inside and Outside the Firewall?
The lines between external and internal communities are becoming increasingly blurred. If your vendor doesn't have an answer for playing nicely with SharePoint and can't turn that around and go external, move on.What Are Their Social Media Credentials?
You can quantify this pretty easily. Do they blog? Are they good at involving customers in the conversation? If they haven't synchronized their own communications, there's a good chance they can't do it for you.Is The Platform Geared For Particular Verticals?
Did the vendor grow up in a particular industry? If so, you might find the product cluttered with unnecessary or thin layers of specific applications you don't need. You'd be surprised how much big paychecks from certain clients influence a product roadmap.How Strong Is Their Channel?
A good sign of a platform's maturity is how many partners have latched on. The key here is to let the solution providers, integrators and digital agencies make the platform hum. While most of the time you can find a good contingency of subject matter experts (SMEs) on the vendor side, the channel is the ecosystem that makes things tick.Have They Worked With Agencies Before?
One of Telligent's strengths is our agency network. Ad agencies, PR firms and interactive shops use Community Server everyday to deliver online campaigns and automate processes internally. Make sure your vendor understands the agency workflow.
What About 3rd Party Alliances?
This is critical as you expand your online efforts. Whether it's a CRM integration,or an e-commerce application, the odds are you'll want to extend your social computing platform as your community grows. Take a close look at who the vendor goes to market with and how they leverage each other.
Send me your questions, I'm putting together a second version now.
First posted on the Telligent blog.
Link to original post