Email as social media

Email is often described as the first and most resilient form of online social media. It is also said to be as doomed as yesterday's newspapers. The future became a bit clearer this week when Exact Target purchased CoTweet, a system that helps companies to communicate through Twitter at the enterprise level. The message of the merger is that organizations need to be prepared to communicate through the medium of the consumer's choosing. The reaction was very positive. Kyle Lacy excitedly dashed off five ways that the new company could change social media, focusing on collaboration and ROI measurement. Convince and Convert (4 Reasons the Social Business Evolution Starts Now) spotted the seeds of an automated, integrated social media dashboard. The leaders of the two companies provided their vision of the full communications feature set in Venture Beat.

Exact Target is an example of a traditional email company moving towards social media. Confirmation is provided from the other direction by a huge new email system called Project Titan. Facebook is apparently not ready to empty the inbox quite yet.

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