Byline: Christopher Hosford
Alan Belniak Title: Director-social media marketing Company: Parametric Technology Corp. Years in current job: 2
ALAN BELNIAK HEADS up social outreach at Parametric Technology Corp, a Boston-based software company focusing on product life cycle management. Social media, he said, is essential to providing feedback to marketing, R&D, sales and other areas of the company.
"We were cognizant that people were having conversations about products and brands all over the Internet; and, in fact, we were taking part in many of those conversations ourselves," he said. "But with the social world being what it is, it's challenging to say you know where all the conversations are happening."
To get a better handle on that interchange, Belniak spearheaded the company's efforts in creating a community forum, PlanetPTC. Its focus isn't just on tech support but rather leveraging the energy and passion of the company's customers, Belniak said.
"The three verbs that are tenets of the community are 'showcase,' 'network' and 'inspire,' " he said. "When you get people excited about you, frankly they'll go to market for you."
In addition to PTC's main forum, the company developed several special-interest forums organized by product areas. Community members also have the ability to create their own subcommunities on certain topics.
"We monitor those, which gives us a sense of where people are taking our products," Belniak said.
Belniak added that no direct marketing is conducted on PlanetPTC; it serves as a listening post.
"I'm trying to urge marketers to do more listening, to gain insight," he said. "With PlanetPTC, we have one additional ear listening to what's going on. We're witnessing firsthand the interaction among people who are using our software."
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