Applications for social networking are easy to see in the business-to-consumer space for functions such as sales, marketing, and customer service. But is there also a role for social tools in heavy back-office B2B processes? At first glance, the applications may not be apparent. But when the word "collaboration" is substituted for "social," we can see that B2B organizations made use of these technologies long before the word "social" came into vogue. Think Lotus Notes, for example. Nevertheless, the opportunities for exploiting social business tools are growing, and nowhere is there a greater need for social business applications than in supply chain management, specifically for use with planning systems.
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