Mashable posted a thought provoking article on the question “Is Social Media making Corporate Websites irrelevant?”. Our short answer is “no”, but our long answer is about the role that corporate websites play in the overall digital footprint of a brand. Adam Ostrow, the author of the Mashable article, articulates a good set of pros & cons of using Facebook vs Corporate Site in a campaign, and concludes by leaning towards a Facebook based campaign.

The either-or question posed by the article is a limited one, or rather is subtext in a larger question about the role of each of the online elements (Corporate site, BrandAdda, Facebook, Ning, Myspace, Orkut, Youtube, Flickr, Twitter, etc etc) in a Brand’s digital presence. We believe that Brands sorely need Engagement with Consumers to thrive in the new world, and need an Engagement platform that goes beyond the boundaries of a specific Social Media destination, even if the destination is something as large as Facebook. In other words, a “portable” or “multi-platform” engagement experience that “integrates” the best of each destination is what’s needed. It frees Brands from trying to pick one or the other, or investing in multiple, disconnected campaigns.

Corporate websites are great for “informational content” around a Brand. Building engagement tools into a corporate website is expensive (time, money, security vulnerabilities, performance, traffic acquisition, etc) and a silo’d effort. Engagement is best left to destinations that are focussed on it. Traffic is best leveraged wherever it is. What is needed is an effort to integrate the best-of-breed tools and destinations into a cohesive platform.

Imagine this scenario, which we’re enabling with the BrandAdda platform.  Brand X has FAQs and other informational content / support content on its corporate site. It shares “how-to” videos, and exclusive clips of its Brand Ambassador on YouTube. It has an “Idea Center” to tap into the creativity of its audience. It has a “Promotion Center” where it publishes its offers/promotions. It has an “Ad Center” where it publishes its big-budget ad-campaigns content to solicit feedback on how the campaigns are doing and to optimize its campaigns. It needs to do quick dipstick studies with polls. Wouldn’t it be great if a consumer can experience all of this functionality & content, regardless of whether they are on Ning or Facebook or a corporate site?.

You may call this “Engagement in a box”, or “ONE-Social”. We call it “BrandAdda” :).