To The New World Of Work (NAPSA)—Just as social media and mobile technologies are changing how individuals connect with friends and family, they are also changing how consumers and businesses interact. For small businesses to respond faster to change and deliver better customer experiences, they need to work like a network so they can listen, adapt and grow in new ways. Gone are the days when customers would write a letter to a companyif they weren’t pleased with the service they received. Now they just take to posting on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other social media channels to vent their displeasure. Today’s customers demand better service, and companies need to adapt to this changing world. There are four trends driving the transformation of the workplace: * Information overload. Data is abundant, and employees need to make senseofit all and translate to action. * Powerof the network. Network technology enables people to access information and insights from both internal and external sources in real time. Flexible work styles. Companies and employees are adopting more flexible and mobile work styles, making physical workspace less important and collaboration tools more important. *Distributed teams. People work across organizational and geographical boundaries to get things done. At the center of it all, social technologies are making it easier for companies to stay ahead of these trends and become more responsive organizations. Social technologies are transforming businesses for the better in many ways, by enhancing the way employees work together, as well as how companies interact with clients and customers. FO Increasingly, today’s best busi- ness practicescall for companies to find ways to be in constant contact with their customers—the closerto real time, the better. For example, companies that wantto do a better job of communicating with employees and enabling employees to share information and insights with one another in real time are choosing to roll out social network solutions. One such option is Yammer, a private social enterprise network for businesses that’s designed to help employees connect and collaborate across departments, locations and business appsto get things done. Businesses that want to doa better job of managing customer relationships are turning to customer relationship management over the Internet—such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, software that provides customer insights so businesses can serve them better. It helps businesses of all sizes to manage contacts, monitor social media activity, and manage the sales cycle with new andexisting customers. Finally, companies that want to create a moreflexible work environment are turning to cloud productivity solutions such as Office 365. It was created to makeit possible for businesses to connect people to information and each other more quickly than everbefore. To learn more, visit https:// about.yammer.com/product/office 365.
