Salesforce.com on Social Networking

Ross Mayfield posted an excerpt from an interview with the CSO of Salesforce.com in regard to Social Networking. The interview was conducted by IBDN, but I wasn’t able to find a direct link. However, here’s a quote from the M2M blog:

IBDN: We know that consumers will pay to find a date, but will they pay to find business contacts?

FULBRIGHT: Yes, one name for them is “leads,” and sales and marketing organizations pay thousands of dollars for leads today. Leads are the life-blood of every business. Another type of paid business contact is called “candidates,” and again companies have been paying recruiters or internal referrals thousands of dollars for great candidates for at least 50 years.

Especially now, with tight budgets, businesses must run more efficiently and want to find the right contacts to meet their needs, in as streamlined a manner as possible. To the extent that businesses can start with warm leads instead of cold leads, and an existing pool of candidates when they have an opening, they will save millions of dollars.

I’d like to add that companies such as MediaMap and Vocus specialize in facilitating the “lead” connections — especially in the Public Relations industry, which is an industry that feeds on “social connections”.