Benefits
By empowering people to easily connect with employees, partners, and customers, IBM Connections can help businesses, government agencies, educational institutions, and others realize the following benefits:
Task execution is faster through quick access to information from an expanded professional network
Increased efficiency and effectiveness of business processes by using existing skills discovered through your professional network
Decisions can be made with confidence knowing they were vetted by experts across the organization and reflect past experience
Innovative products and services can be developed using the experiences and knowledge of communities of employees, partners, and customers
Sustainable competitive advantage can be created by leveraging innovation from across your value chain and building stronger relationships
Exchange ideas with, and benefit from the expertise of other people using Forums and Blogs
Expand your professional network through social analytics based recommendations for people to connect with, and communities to join
Build vibrant communities that encourage participation with sub-communities focused on key topics of interest to the members
Access profile information, search for expertise, and view status quickly
Stay informed of the latest updates from across your social network
Access your social data while on the go via the micro-browser or the device specific application
Extend your social business solution by accessing people and information in several of your existing IBM solutions such as IBM Sametime, IBM Lotus Notes, IBM Lotus Quickr, and IBM enterprise content management (ECM) systems - IBM FileNet® Content Manager and IBM Content Manager.
IBM Lotus Notes 8.5.3 customers are entitled to IBM Connections Files and Profiles thereby providing an easy path to becoming a social business.
Extend data protection by integrating Connections with IBM® Lotus® Protector for Mail Security. IBM Lotus Protector for Mail Security now provides virus protection for files uploaded to Connections files, communities, wikis, and activities.
Add security and real time policy management controls with Vantage for IBM Connections. Vantage for IBM Connections helps social business organizations remain compliant with key regulatory and corporate requirements by delivering additional security and compliance benefits beyond native IBM Connections implementations.
Integrated mobile support
IBM Connections allows mobile users access to their corporate Connections data on-the-go via a micro-browser or a mobile application (device dependent). Supported devices include: Apple iOS 4.0 and 5.0, Android 2.2 and above, Blackberry OS6, Nokia (micro-browser only), and RIM Playbook (micro-browser only)
The IBM Connections mobile applications are available directly from the device vendor's digital distribution platform (app store).
Click the links below to go directly to the app store for your device.
Android Market (link resides outside of ibm.com)
Apple App Store (link resides outside of ibm.com)
BlackBerry App World™ (link resides outside of ibm.com)
IBM Connections integrated components
IBM Connections software delivers this capability through the following integrated components:
Communities: Create, find, join, and work with communities of people
Collaborate with community members using activities, blogs, wikis, forums, and shared files, including rich media files
Customize the community by selecting a theme for the user interface, and choosing the arrangement and selection of widgets
View statistics on discussion forum usage and highlight important topics by pinning them for the community
Files: A file-sharing service
Upload files and securely share them with others
Tag files so they can be easily located
Add recommendations and comments
Moderate file submission
Reduce inbox "bloat"
Wikis: You and your teams can collaboratively edit content
Create wikis that are standalone or associated with a community
Create wiki pages; enter and edit content
Compare wiki page versions to see what was changed
Subscribe to wiki pages to be notified of changes
Comment on pages
Profiles: Quickly find the people and expertise you need
Post a status message informing your network of what you are doing
Locate people and expertise using a tag cloud
Post messages for your colleagues on their profile page
Blogs: Present your ideas in a Weblog and get feedback from others
Create a blog for use by the members of a community
Embed a video in a blog posting to make it available to readers
Moderate blog entries
Generate ideas and gather feedback on ideas. Get consensus on best ideas.
Bookmarks: Save, organize, and share bookmarks using social bookmarking
Import and export bookmarks from and to a browser
Activities: Gather the e-mails, IM chats, documents, messages, and other information that you need to accomplish a business objective
Create an activity for use by the members of a community
Home page: Remain informed of social data updates from across the IBM Connections services
Stay up-to-date by scanning the new list format for displaying updates from across your professional network
Subscribe to people or tags in the watchlist to focus on the updates that are most important to you
Forums: Provide a convenient way to create an on-line discussion board where people can ask questions, share their experiences, and discuss topics of common interest. Optionally, forums can be moderated. Participating in a forum allows you to benefit from the expertise of other people through the exchange of ideas with your teammates and others who share your interest in a topic.
Social Analytics: widgets are available in the Home Page, Communities, and Profiles and can help you to:
Expand your professional network
Find content and communities that might interest you
A new Recommendations widget appears in the Home Page and Communities applications.
In the Home Page application, this widget recommends content that you might find interesting based on your existing community membership, network connections, tags, and so forth.
In the Communities application, the Recommendations widget suggests communities that you might want to join.
The following three new widgets appear in Profiles:
Do You Know: This widget recommends people for you to add to your network based on your existing connections, tags, organizational relationships, and actions that you have taken in the different applications.
Things in Common: This widget helps you identify what you have in common with a person. For example, the widget might display a list of the communities that you and the profile owner both belong to, or a list of the tags that you have both used.
Who Connects Us: This widget allows you to view the social path that links you to a person when you are viewing that person's profile. The social path displays as a list of people who link you and the profile owner.
