Drupal Developer's Journal

One of the most hotly debated questions among marketers and company executives is “What does it mean to be a social business?”Today Acquia, Inc., the enterprise guide to the Drupal social publishing system provides the answer and also reveals what Social Business Software vendors aren’t telling you: your investment in Social Business Software is at risk because it is only a one-sided approach to social business. Social publishing is the technology platform for true social businesses.

Social publishing, specifically Drupal, is the convergence of web content management software (WCM) and social software tools in a single, unified platform. As a result, Drupal transcends boundaries between internal Enterprise 2.0 applications and external Web 2.0 applications. Drupal is a community driven Open Source platform with over 4,000 modules and a 600,000 member community that drives innovation.

“Not all social business technologies are created equal,” said Tom Erickson, Acquia CEO. “Some vendors will tell you that social business is about internal collaboration; some will tell you it’s about external customer engagement. Our take: it’s truly both and Drupal social publishing is the right way to get your business engaged with all of its audiences. What Social Business Software vendors won’t tell you is their value disappears when you want a single unified platform to power the web. The Drupal open source social publishing system gives companies the flexibility with their brands to capitalize on emerging opportunities.”

Based upon the experiences of a huge Drupal ecosystem that contributes new modules for every desired function back to the community, and Acquia’s own expertise in guiding companies with the Drupal open source publishing system, being a social business means:

• Accepting that everyone in your company is a marketer: from corporate communications to your engineering team, everyone has a role in how your business and brand are perceived.
• Understanding that collaboration with customers is only as good as your ability to connect your community with your primary web activities, and then tune the social media feedback loop inward and make real business moves in response.
• Realizing that the number one concern of everyone at the board room table is reputation management, and operating a responsive social business is the only way to address it.

"Just as the search economy up-ended the old outbound direct mail marketing economy, the new social web stands ready to transform marketing once again," said Tim O'Reilly, founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media. “If you’re not using technology to bridge the gap between Enterprise 2.0 and Web 2.0 you’re missing the boat. Look for solutions that turn customers into brand messengers and your employees into a multi-functional group of brand stakeholders.”

What social business vendors provide the enterprise today:

• Compartmental collaboration technology that addresses today’s social media channels, not tomorrow’s
• A limited vision of social business that does not adequately address the tie between internal collaboration technology and external customer engagement
• The same old proprietary software game; innovation slows dramatically after initial adoption
• Vendors focused on high end niche problems for a narrow range of special uses to justify a high six figure price tag

What enterprises really need:

• ONE technology solution that seamlessly marries content management and Social Software, not silo collaboration functions
• Single platform to power the web in a company; public facing websites, external facing communities, and internal facing collaboration
• The ability to quickly and easily extend your brand by launching multiple sites in response to new opportunities
• An Open Source community of over 600,000 driving the speed of innovation and developing over 4,000 modules
• A social software solution that doesn’t trip you up – whether you’re marketing to customers or organizing a product development team

About Acquia

Acquia helps organizations of all sizes build social publishing websites quickly, easily and with a lower total cost of ownership by leveraging Drupal, the open source social publishing platform that blends content and community. Our products, services and support enable companies to leverage the power, technical innovation and economic value of Drupal while simplifying the experience, removing the complexity and minimizing the risk. Please visit: http://acquia.com. Download Acquia Drupal, the completely free Drupal distribution, at http://acquia.com/downloads.

About Drupal

The Drupal social publishing system has been downloaded over 2 million times since its inception and powers more than 400,000 web sites globally. Drupal is unique because it was built at the intersection of Web CMS and Social Software from the beginning. Because it is a robust web application platform, a community of tens of thousands of developers have been able to build functionality for Drupal and create a Social Publishing solution- a feat that is impossible for a proprietary vendor with their own internal R&D team. Drupal includes an enterprise class content management system and is used to deliver a wide variety of web applications including single or multi-user blogs, wikis, community networks, digital media portals, e-commerce, and many more. Assisted by a thriving ecosystem of consultants and developers, a diverse set of organizations use Drupal including SonyBMG, Warner Brothers Records, the New York Observer, Forbes, Disney, Intel, Harvard University, and Amnesty International. For more information, visit http://drupal.org.