It is not fair to bring real business problems to an over-hyped and under-delivered “solution”.

You have hit the nail in the head, the problem is not the collecting of data or the listening – even the monitoring — the problem is the understanding of the collected data and drawing value out of it (actionable insights) and using it to further the business purpose.

Nice example to showcase the shortcomings of SCRM to date.

Esteban

Right on about the need to extract value from this wonderful world of social media. Otherwise, all we have is much, much more noise. Which, becomes counter-productive as already stretched resources now have to deal with even more.

You said: “Or is it going to take another million posts to discover people want to plug the hole in their coffee cups?”

Reminds me of how airlines are making the move to social media to “engage” customers(see http://ow.ly/ynNM). First thing I thought was: so, they need to hear another 10,000 times just what’s wrong with their airline? So, when were they planning on getting around to actually taking action? What’s the magic number that’ll convince them that customers hate delays?

As far as Analytics(absolutely KEY!) I can think of:
- Networked Insights http://www.networkedinsights.com/
- Lithium http://www.lithium.com/
- Techrigy’s SM2 http://www.techrigy.com/
I don’t find any of the above truly comprehensive but together with a hodgepodge of traditional Web 2.0 analytical tools you can put something together to get you started on the path to insights(and action).

Esteban Kolsky(@ekolsky) has been leading discussion of the need for analytics, specifically. Might be a good person to get in touch with.

Thanks!
Russ
Seattle, WA
http://www.twitter.com/russhatfield