Overview
Social Media Information System (SMIS) is used to support the process of content sharing between the users of a particular network. In addition, SMIS include the communities of users (groups that are based on common interests and go beyond organizational or geographical limits), the providers of social media (entities that manage and operate social media sites) as well as social media sponsors (organizations that sustain their presence on a number of social media sites), for instance, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and many others. SMIS can benefit the connections between companies and their clients as parties that process and create new content on social media.
Despite the benefits, SMISs are not free. It costs a lot to develop and manage procedures connected with social networking as well as it takes funds to pay employees for their contributions in social networking management. Companies like Walmart or Starbucks that directly deal with social media to facilitate sales usually implement SMIS.
Customer Relationship Management
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software is able to cover a wide range of various applications intended to aid businesses in managing interactions with customers, customer data, as well as to manage sales. Nowadays CRM software can be customized to fit the needs of any type of business in order for the company to acquire insights about the behavior of existing and potential customers. CRM is usually offered in a variety of different installations that include cloud applications and on-premise (local) applications. In the case of local installations, CRM software is kept within the firewall of the company and is usually controlled by Information Technology operations.
The benefit of this is that the information is kept in a secure manner. In the case of cloud installations, the software is offered by a provider and is accessed by clients and companies online. Despite this method also being secure, the main benefits are the convenience and that the same applications can be implemented for mobile use (Beal, n.d.a, para. 3).
Enterprise Resource Planning
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software is usually made up of several modules of enterprise software that are bought separately to target the needs of every organization. As ERP gained momentum, software applications for both mobile and on-site use have emerged. Managers can incorporate ERP into various activities of business by means of installing CRM and BI modules thus creating a complete package of software.
There are four Enterprise Resource Planning trends that include cloud ERP, mobile ERP, two-tier ERP, and social ERP. Mobile ERP is used by the businesses’ executives for instant access to information while cloud ERP becomes the most used method of application installation. The two-tier method of ERP installation is used by enterprises for implementation of two systems at the same time. Lastly, with the growing importance of social media, social ERP has become a method for adding social media system packaging into the common framework used by corporations (Beal, n.d.b, para. 6).
Social Media Information System
Social Media Information System (SMIS) software is usually created to support the requirement of information systems within the Business to Business (B2B) framework. Such systems can be installed through cloud applications by software providers. To implement social media information systems on mobile devices, cloud software installations are the most convenient (Mullarkey, 2014, p. 101). Enterprise 2.0 is an application designed specifically for social media information systems for facilitating a united process inside the company.
References
Beal, V. (n.d.a). CRM Software – Customer Relationship Management Software. Web.
Beal, V. (n.d.b). ERP – Enterprise Resource Planning. Web.
Mullarkey, M. (2014). Inter-Organizational Social Network Information Systems: Diagnosing and Design. Web.