Dell Launches New Social Media Strategic Unit

The PC giant is launching its own social media services group that will compete with the likes of Dynamic Signal, Salesforce, and IBM

Over the past year, Dell has been providing social “listening” and strategy services to 10 major clients on a test basis. Dell now plans to expand its services to new and existing clients.

Dell has been making conspicuous strides to become a more service-oriented company. In 2009, Dell acquired IT services provider Perot Systems for $3.9 Billion. Dell’s services division currently houses 42,000 employees, with many who transferred from Perot.

Dell’s move to become more service oriented was no surprise to Peter O’Neill, a principal analyst at Forrester. He noted that Dell competitors such as Hewlett-Packard and IBM are moving in a similar direction with their business models. This shift comes largely due to the fact that enterprise buyers of PC’s are fiercely loyal to their brands. Technology between competitors is so similar that brand switching comes with more problems than benefits, making it hard for PC companies to increase their market share based on hardware and software sales.

Although serious stride have been made in earnest to provide new services and value to their customers, more must be done to stay on top.

The business of social “listening” — monitoring and reacting to what is being said in social media — is a baseline service already offered by myriad agencies, startups and big enterprise and consulting firms, such as Accenture. If Dell wants to add related activities such as community management, lead generation or the infrastructure to manage brands’ social-media presence, it may have to make an acquisition, Mr. O’Neill said.