Oracle recently acquired Vitrue for $300 million and Salesforce.com acquired Buddy Media for $800 million. These acquisitions address the first phases of integrating social media into enterprises by allowing outbound social media campaigns. However, they still lack the ability to analyze social data and integrate it into existing customer applications. Buzzient addresses this need by providing social media integration and analytics capabilities to complement the acquired companies' outbound social marketing functions. The author predicts continued acquisition activity in this area along with the emergence of independent social media integration providers and an expansion of social CRM to other business applications and platforms.

1. Thoughts on Vitrue and BuddyMedia | Buzzient http://www.buzzient.com/blog/thoughts-on-vitrue-and-buddymedia/
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May 31, 2012
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No Comments Man, how things can change quickly. After four years of predicting that The Coming Social Media Gold Rush…or…Facebook is
enterprise application giants would enter the social sphere through M&A, it just the beginning…
looks like it’s happening. Oracle bought Vitrue last week for $300M and now Salesforce.com is buying Well, we’re in the last few days before the iconic...
Buddy Media for $800M. My phone has been ringing for days with people asking me to predict “Who’s Read More »
next?”. I just might start a blog called “Social Nostradamus” on the side. ;o)
In looking at these two acquisitions though, it’s important to realize how early we really are in the social
revolution. First of all, I want to acknowledge and congratulate both Reggie Bradford and Mike Lazerow;
Tag Cloud
both are first rate gentlemen and great entrepreneurs who I’ve had the opportunity to meet several times.
adam metz Buzzient CRM
They’ve built great companies and great cultures, and deserve all the fruits of their labors.
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I should state that both of these deals are very synergistic with Buzzient and our strategy. In both cases,
the Buzzient Enterprise applications are complementary; Vitrue and Buddy Media both manage the
Enterprise Integration
outbound social media marketing and monitoring function, whereas Buzzient handles the inbound social Facebook Innovation District
Entrepreneurship
analytics and social CRM integration roles. So, both companies were potential partners for us. Instagram Integration Interactive Intelligence Lead
Generation lessons learned Loyalty M&A Open Social
By “early in the the social revolution”, I’d like to point to a previous blog post: Enterprise Oracle Press Radian6 Retail
Salesforce.com Siebel siebel crm
http://www.buzzient.com/blog/the-three-phases-of-enterprise-social-media/ SocialCRM Social CRM social
customer social enterprise
Both of these acquisitions address the first 1-2 phases of the enterprise social media challenge. Now, both applications Socialmedia Social
Oracle and Salesforce will have robust capabilities to create outbound campaigns targeted at social media
users on Facebook(largely) and some other social platforms.
Media Social Media
Analytics social media
What’s STILL missing from the puzzle, however, is the ability to tie the analytics and data back to existing
integration Social Media Management Social
customer applications. That is, “How do you get all this new social data into the existing Siebel, Salesforce, Media Marketing Social Media Publishing social
and other applications that are already in place?”. That’s where Buzzient comes in, and offers a media reach Social Media Tools social network analysis
complementary social media integration capability that neither Vitrue nor Buddy Media developed. Also, Techcrunch Technology Twitter workflow
given the heterogeneous nature of complex Fortune 5000 technology infrastructures, there will always be a
need for a capability to monitor, analyze, and integrate social media that is not vendor-specific.
Social CRM and the Enterprise
So, where does this all go? I predict the following:
Adam Metz Enterprise Software Insider
- Continued M&A by enterprise software companies to tightly couple a social monitoring capability to their Oracle CRM Blog Paul Greenberg CRM
app stacks. Social media monitoring is basic table stakes now, like browser accessibility was in 1996.
Web Strategy by Jeremiah Xenophon Strategies
- Emergence of a handful of social media integration independents, who take monitoring to the next level
and enable full social CRM integration. (Buzzient is already one of them)
- Extension of social CRM to other app categories (ERP, HCM). (Buzzient has already done this with Infor
Workspace, for example)
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2. Thoughts on Vitrue and BuddyMedia | Buzzient http://www.buzzient.com/blog/thoughts-on-vitrue-and-buddymedia/
- Establishment of a common integration framework based on API’s from several vendors (Yep, we’ve got
an API, too)
These are just a few of our picks. Let us know if you have other predictions.
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