You’re shopping for a company who creates, deploys and maintains online social media communities. What should you be looking for? Does it matter whether a provider is small or large? If you get a lower price and what appears to be a better proposal from a startup with a short track record, should you take it?

Weighing the Pros and Cons of Small Versus Large

Many young, small startups in the social media space create dazzling innovations that might give your community an edge. But does your prospective startup have the bandwidth to take care of your needs over the long term? You have to be certain that a firm with a limited number of employees has enough resources to cover issues that arise post-launch. A larger social media vendor will have separate, well-established departments dedicated to addressing the inevitable problems that are part of the process, before and after deployment.

Communicate, then Comprehend What Your Smaller Vendor Is All About

 If you believe a smaller, less costly provider is a good fit for you, the most important aspect of your relationship is clear communication. You need to understand a potential partner’s philosophy, then examine real-world examples of how the company’s leaders implement that philosophy. Before you take the leap, make sure your dialogue with a vendor has depth and meaning—don’t succumb to a combination of buzz words and sizzle. Ask for the steak.

Research Online, then Take Care in Preparing Your RFP

Details about any prospective vendor, even smaller firms, should be easy to access on the Internet. After all, if they are any good at social media, they should have a dynamic web presence, even if their quantity of projects is limited. Online information should give you a “homework head-start” before you initiate contact. When you prepare a request for proposal, take care to clearly outline your social media objectives. Also, get to know a future partner’s people intimately—especially if a company’s executive staff is smaller in scale.

How Dynamic and Complex Do You Want Your Online Community to Be?

Are you diving into the social networking space in a big way, or is your plan to start small and grow your social media footprint as you become more fluent with social networking? If you’re contemplating a more gradual approach, many smaller providers are excellent at creating individual tools which can be deployed at a lower cost and still have a significant impact. Some of these widgets may be integrated within your existing web sites without the expense of launching a white label community that boasts multi-layered solutions and tools.

Perhaps You Really Need All of the Services a Well-Established Vendor Can Provide

A larger social media solutions organization usually furnishes a greater degree of reliability and deployment experience. Also, if a company has been in business for many years (rather than a few), they will have cohesive departments that perform consistently. If a less seasoned prospect neglects account management, client services, product development, Q&A, or engineering refreshes, your social media venture could be compromised in a short interval. On the other hand, an experienced, recognized vendor can offer you the confident fulfillment only relationships with large, well-known organizations can forge over time.

Summing up the Risk and Reward of Choosing Small over Large

One benefit of going with a smaller provider is that you have a good chance of receiving more personalized service since you will be a big focus of their efforts. This probability has an appeal all its own and may be a good fit for your size and immediate intentions. You can always consider switching vendors and social media platforms if it doesn’t work out. But there are unavoidable challenges—and obvious costs—in switching providers, either early or late. Extracting data from an old platform, plugging it into a new one, then re-implementing integration...these are all expensive propositions. However, if a smaller prospect’s depth of personnel, breadth of services and financial strength aren’t paramount to you, the smaller pick could prove advantageous.

Hitting the Sweet Spot in Your Decision-Making

 In terms of a vendor’s head count, perhaps a moderate approach on your part might ultimately be the most successful. An organization with hundreds of employees could simply be too large for your corporate culture. But a youthful startup with two to 15 overworked individuals might be too small. In the final analysis, your search may advance more productively if you shoot for the middle and start by researching social media firms with growing ranks of 20 to 50 experienced professionals. An organization of this relative size might deliver the best of all worlds to your social media debut. All told, a mid-size company would be small enough to be fast and flexible, but still be well-versed in all of the processes that equate success.

Please express your opinions about the search for a perfect-size solutions provider in the social networking space.