社交媒体不疯魔不成活

    史宗玮可谓年轻有为。五岁时跟随父母从香港移居美国。由于没有接受双语教育的渠道，她最初被安排在专门为语言障碍儿童开设的班级中，但她进步非常迅速，八年级时她的学术水平测试（SAT）得分高达1420分。27岁时，史宗玮创办了Hearsay Social。去年，她被《财富》杂志（Fortune）评为“最具影响力的女企业家”（Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs）之一，并于十月份完婚（丈夫是一位神经科专家）。为了参加《财富》最具影响力女性峰会，她推迟了蜜月旅行。就在上个月，史宗玮接替Facebook首席运营官谢丽尔•桑德博格，加入星巴克公司（Starbucks）董事会。今天，作为Hearsay Social 首席执行官的史宗玮正好30岁，而此时也正是她与我们分享经验的最佳时刻：

    两年前，我认识到社交媒体是一个全新的商业模式，其规模与十年前的英特网旗鼓相当，甚至更大，因此我创建了企业社交软件公司Hearsay Social。借助Hearsay这个平台，零售商、金融服务公司，以及在各地聘用大量员工的其他类型的公司都可以管理Facebook、商务社交网站LinkedIn、Twitter和Google+ 。我们从红杉资本（Sequoia Capital）和恩颐投资（New Enterprise Associates）获得了2,100万美元的投资。目前，Hearsay有60多名员工，公司2010年投入运营，当年就实现了正向现金流。

    我们认为，公司的发展恰恰证明了社交企业的变革性力量。看看这组数据就知道了：一年前，Facebook、Twitter和LinkedIn的用户数量分别是5亿、1亿和5,000万，而当时还没问世的Google+根本没有用户。而现在，Facebook用户数量已经超过了10亿，其他网站的用户数量也增长了一倍多。

    但是，公司发展过程也印证了我这些年学到的东西。2007年，我开始涉足社交媒体领域。当时我为Facebook研发了第一款企业应用程序Faceforce。正是这一经历让我创作了《纽约时报》（New York Times）最畅销书籍《Facebook时代》（The Facebook Era）。之前，我曾担任过微软（Microsoft）的工程师，后在谷歌（Google）负责产品策略，之后又在客户关系管理软件服务供应商Salesforce.com负责AppExchange。无论是Faceforce应用，还是《Facebook时代》一书，都预见了社交类企业的崛起，这帮我发现了市场的空白，并开始追求我真正的梦想：创立一家新公司。

    十年前，在斯坦福大学（Stanford）的计算机编程入门课上，我认识了现在的合作伙伴史蒂夫•加利蒂。后来，他辞去了微软的安稳工作，和我共同创业。史蒂夫现任Hearsay Social首席技术官，而我担任CEO。当时，我们是在我的公寓（位于旧金山俄罗斯山的一个社区）里创办了这家公司。我们在公司的发展过程中总结了以下几点重要经验：

    1. 快速行动。技术领域日新月异，迅速验证和更新创意非常关键。通常情况下，能获得成功的往往是行动最迅速、头脑最灵敏，同时善于学习的人，而不是第一个吃螃蟹的人。

    2. 保持专注。我们只和本地化品牌企业（corporate-to-local brands）合作——也就是在各地设有分公司或代表处的大公司。精确的定位使我们可以合理利用有限的创业资源，并指导我们从产品定位到销售策略，以及人员招聘等每个决策。我认为这是我们最大的优势之一。

    Clara Shih is an early achiever. At age five, she arrived in the U.S., from Hong Kong, with her parents. With no access to bilingual education, she was initially placed in special classes for kids with speech impediments and advanced so rapidly that she scored a 1420 on her SATs -- in eighth grade. She started her company, Hearsay Social, at age 27, made Fortune's list of Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs last year, and married her neurologist boyfriend in October (delaying her honeymoon to attend the Fortune MPW Summit.) Last month, Shih was tapped to replace Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg on the Starbucks (SBUX) board. And today, she turns 30 years old. There is no better timing for the Hearsay Social CEO to share, well, lessons from her youth:

    I head an enterprise software company called Hearsay Social, which I founded two years ago after realizing that social media is a fundamentally new business paradigm -- as big as, or even bigger than, the Internet was a decade ago. Hearsay is a platform that helps companies -- retailers, financial services firms, and anyone else with a lot of employees in a lot of locations --manage Facebook, LinkedIn (LNKD), Twitter, and Google+ (GOOG). We've raised $21 million in venture capital from Sequoia Capital and New Enterprise Associates. We employ more than 60 people, and we were cash-flow positive in 2010, our first year of operation.

    We think of our growth as a testament to the transformational power of social business. Consider this: A year ago, there were 500 million Facebook users, 100 million Twitter users, 50 million LinkedIn users, and 0 Google+ users (it did not yet exist). Today, there are over 1 billion people on Facebook, and the other networks too have more than doubled in size.

    But our growth also reflects what I've learned along the way. I began my social-media journey in 2007, when I developed the first business application on Facebook, called Faceforce. It was this experience -- after working as an engineer at Microsoft (MSFT), in product strategy at Google, and then as head of the AppExchange at Salesforce.com (CRM) -- that led me to write a New York Times bestseller, The Facebook Era. Both the app and the book, which forecasted the rise of social business, helped me identify gaps in the market and pursue my real dream: building a startup.

    Today, my business partner is Steve Garrity, whom I had met a decade ago in an introductory computer programming class at Stanford. He quit a safe job at Microsoft to join me in this venture. Steve is chief technology officer of Hearsay Social. I'm the CEO. Since we started the business in my apartment in the Russian Hill neighborhood of San Francisco, here are a few key lessons we've picked up:

    1. Move fast. In the rapidly evolving technology arena, it's critical to test and iterate new ideas quickly. Often, it's the fastest and most agile learner rather than the best first attempt that wins.

    2. Focus. We work exclusively with corporate-to-local brands—major companies that have local branches or representatives. Our laser focus makes us prioritize our scarce startup resources and guides every decision we make, from what to build to how to sell to whom to employ. I believe this is one of our greatest strengths.