Experience Architect, from Live Path

Mixing it up in Chicago

2009-10-18T01:10:00.000-04:00

I've got a follow up post in the hopper to my "Trust" piece - but have been waylaid with client work the last two weeks PLUS getting ready to migrate my site... so I haven't had a minute to write! Here's a quick update.

Next week, I ship off to Madison, Wisconsin and then Chicago, IL where I'll be doing some one-on-one therapy and moderating a panel at the Marketing Profs Digital Mixer. I'm excited to talk relationship building on Twitter with Ann Handley - one of my all around favorite people, author and Chief Content Officer of Marketing Profs. John Bernier, all around nice guy and head of Best Buy's Twelpforce will also be there - and I'm stoked to meet him in person...along with Monique Trulson, all around ebusiness whiz from Hello Direct who is now with Brady People ID. There's a lot to look forward to, as Marketing Profs draws terrific speakers and creates a wonderful format for deep interaction -- and fun. I'm also stoked to visit with other friends, including Beth Harte, Mack Collier, Jay Baer, Paul Chaney, Becky Carroll, Amber Naslund, the rest of Marketing Profs crew (especially Shelley Ryan) and others! If you're near Chicago and it's convenient, check out the information about the Digital Mixer here.... and I hope to see you there, too!

On Plagiarism, Snake Oil and Prayer

2009-09-24T13:17:00.170-04:00

Peter Kim and David Armano both posted on the subject of Plagiarism recently. I started responses to both -- but today's post is largely a response to Peter's post from yesterday. Actually, this started as a comment and grew - and I'm warning you now -- it's a somewhat unedited rant.

In truth, nothing is really free. There is a direct cost associated with research and the work we do as professionals. Our time is worth money -- so are our thoughts. For excellence junkies like myself and many of my peers, there is also the emotional capital we invest in birthing original thought, visualizing something new and contributing something of value to our community.

We rationalize giving "stuff" away with the argument that this will help build our influence, credibility, stimulate discussion and build relationships that yield specific business outcomes (gigs, sales, etc.). By and large, this works. So we do it because the trade off is, in some sense, profitable.

This is true even when we deal with bad apples: These are the copy cats and snake oil salesmen who skirt licensing and permissions and make unethical use of IP and content. We've all seen them at work and many of us have seen our work replicated and re-branded by others in a way that has been disconcerting - and even maddening.

In response to the snakes..n. I have always tried to maintain an optimistic perspective. I generally believe what goes around, comes around... and that MOST people aren't jerks. I have held out hope that smart people will be able to recognize the copy cats and snake-oil salesmen.

In short -- didn't question the trade off, until recently...

In the not to distant past, I encountered a situation where one of my course attendees from a major university announced her intention to take my ideas and course materials and repackage them into a workshop, for which she was charging a premium. Prior to taking my class, this individual couldn't recognize an ear from an elbow with regard to social media - yet the person's desire to reincarnate into a social media "guru"seemed focused and intentional.

I made the discovery two days before the class. While at first I was amused, I then considered the hefty, password protected companion website I'd created for the course. It featured my own laboriously assembled class presentations as well as an array of fully accredited and referenced articles, how-to's, videos, research, case studies , etc. from a variety of sources (some of which I paid to license and others from respected sources and peers in the field).

Needless to say, the site took weeks to assemble - not including the months of collecting I'd done or the pre-course survey I did to make sure I had content tailored to specific types of business. To be honest, if I'd counted those hours in my prep time, I didn't break even teaching that course. However, in truth, I didn't put the site together for money. I wanted to be open about sharing - promote the outstanding work of folks in my social media network -- and enable course participants (mostly SMB's) to help themselves succeed long after I was gone.

I never considered that a course participant might build success by repackaging my work and charging others for it!

After doing a sanity check with a few good friends, I responded by:

Adding a Creative Commons License to the Wiki with legal disclaimers
Adding a course segment on social media ethics where planned to address this type of issue and my practice of taking legal action against offenders.
Praying to God for wisdom about how to deal with the problem.

What happened next is something people have called "Divine Intervention." My "copy cat" was stricken by a "freak illness" the day before class and ended up hospitalized during the days of the course. As a no-show, the person never gained access to the course materials - and I was relieved.

Crisis averted...but BOY did it all make me think ...

Has this made me more reticent to trust? Yes Peter! Absolutely.
Has it made me think more carefully about what and how I share? Yes - and I think I'm afraid I'm still too open for my own good ...
Is Plagiarism changing how I will proceed with monitoring and Creative Commons attribution? Yes.
Will the tools and monitoring and licensing be enough? No, Peter! I don't think so - and here's why:

In my opinion -- beyond the lack of proper awareness and education in this area, I believe the plague of plagiarism is a reflection of a larger crisis of ethics.

As we both know: You can't legislate morality.

Consider the fact that most people do not think twice about ripping CDs and sharing music and images in a manner that is an active violation of Federal Law. The sad truth is that the illegal use of material and especially digital assets is pervasive in our cultures...often "accepted" and practiced -- in households, businesses and even churches across our nation and around globe. While there are some who won't do this because of their own moral convictions -- It is likely that a large number of our readers do this without thinking!

So, why should people view our digital content and IP any differently?

I submit that they do not. We'll see the results outside of business service offerings, white papers and blog posts in the term papers of the future. And with the proliferation of media, it may be more and more difficult to figure out where people are getting their material in the future.

Moving forward, what can we do? Lots of good comments on Peter's post aboout this. My thoughts:

1. Each one of us must take initiative to protect our investments with the resources and tools we have at our disposal. My tool kit includes many of the ones Peter mentioned... Many of these will mature over time - and get better and helping us monitor the "snakeosphere."

2. We can leverage the law where it matters most. Existing laws should help protect us, but I'll go out
on a limb to assert that the law may be most useful for those with a great deal of time and money to spare. For a large number of us, using the law and the courts to resolve issues is likely to be "resource prohibitive."

3. We can find ways to empower the "Social Media Sphere" to police itself.   Community and peer pressure can often go far to change the behavior of the masses. Many of us have asked questions about what we can do about plagiarism. The big question is how we can police ourselves without giving seedy people attention they may actually benefit from? Stuff like mentions, site traffic, inbound links, etc. Google doesn't penalize people for "negative" attention. ;-)

To his credit, Peter "ousted" a few offenders in the comments field of yesterday's post. It needed to be done. However, this is slightly problematic from the standpoint that publicly ousting a snake oil salesman from a high profile, thought leader's blog immediately creates traffic and links in to the web properties of the offender that can boost things like the "T-rating" "G-rating" and site traffic and comments. On the up-side, a least we know who to look out for! The problem is, this can result in greater visibility that might work in the individual's favor...

Also to his credit, Armano didn't link to the guy who was ripping off his feed (at least I didn't see a link). Incidentally, guy was ripping off feeds from other thought leaders, making up quotes and facts about himself,. This guy even had the audacity to rip off his entire site design from Google, and swipe a commercial social media video created by Sprint, removing the brand name and inserting his own!   I'll admit that when I saw this guy at work, I wanted to "out" him to everyone I knew -- "sicking the social media community" on his butt, so to speak... Perhaps we all did -- but we seemed to apply restraint so as not to give this guy any attention that might be used to his advantage. The problem with this is, we can't warn others about the snake oil peddlers this way.

Moving forward, perhaps using a hash tag on Twitter like #snakeoil - just as a way to index this discussion. I'n not sure that would be highly effective as a policing method, though. A few people have suggested creating a "Snake Oil Wiki" - and I'd say it would have to require people to submit screen-grabs of an accused person's offenses AND (in the interest of fairness) offer a forum for accused individuals to defend themselves. This way - it's fair and the evidence remains when sites are changed (as they often are post-discovery). Not sure who wants to take that on, from a legal perspective...but it'd certainly require counsel and legal backup!

In the mean time, I'll continue on...trying hard to provide value and trying to be an optimist. I'll rely on the tools that are available -- in addition to applying prayer as needed when the jerks try to ruin my day. After all, as my story tells, it has proven to be my most effective tool, to date!   ;-)

On Trust and Influence

2009-09-10T17:09:00.009-04:00

Last year at SXSW, Charlene Li gave a great presentation on Social Media Networks and how they will soon be "like air" (naturally, everywhere). She presented the following slide and the diagram got me thinking about trust.

As context, Li was talking how, beyond the contact lists, implicit data helps fill in gaps about the level of closeness or intimacy individuals have with each other. She went on to talk about how this will change in the future based on usage patterns detected by Google and other social networks... painting a picture of a future "social algorithm."

I don't disagree with Li's assertions at all - in fact I think she's spot on. It's the slide above that kept coming to mind. Taking that graphic at a literal level, I don't agree that the implicit data represented above really does help fill in gaps regarding people's relationships in any way other than a subjective one - nor do I think it reflects any kind of accurate indicator of an individual's level of "closeness" or "intimacy" with others (trust). Incidentally, I'm not sure Charlene actually asserted this... I believe the slide was used in a figurative manner.

But it still got me thinking about both sides of the trust equasion. How do individuals (specifically with regard to social media) think about trust with regard to other people? How do marketers look at Trust in the networked economy?

For individuals, here's my take on what the trust spectrum might look like:

Playing off the concept of "circles of trust", we see an outward radiation of trust and intimacy. At the "inner circle" there is high trust. In the outer circle there is "no trust" In further examining trust dynamics, it's fair to assert that people tend to transition back and forth between spheres, depending on events, mood, conversation, disposition and other factors.

If you buy this concept, trust, or intimacy is therefore somewhat fluid. It's also device and technology independent (although the actions at the right of that diagram show how I might interact with individuals using social media terms). We'll come back to this in at the end.

Looking at individual trust from a marketer's perspective, there are probably three core areas of consideration marketers want to examine when targeting "high trust" individuals.

1. VOICE: Understanding where an individual is trusted is an essential component of targeting. Voice examines an individual's level of engagement (posts, tweets, discussions, comments) across various topics (e.g. Frugal Living) and the overall sentiment of that engagement (positive, negative, neutral) over time. In other words:

For example, I might trust Beth Kanter as an authority on non-profits and social media. However, I might not trust her as a good referral source on which flat screen TV I should buy. As such, voice is a critical area of examination related to targeting high-trust individuals.

2. REACH: Examining the network of the individual is also an essential component of targeting. This includes an understanding of the person's online and offline influence, across traditional media channels (e.g. television, print, etc.). In the online channels, reach examines the size and scope of the individual's active network within various sites and networks, as well as the frequency of communication that occurs.

Furthermore, examining how the communication and dialog flows across online and offline channels may be germane to gauging the efficacy of an individual's reach.

INFLUENCE: There's been a lot of talk about influence today - and I don't want to rehash all that dialog. At a high level, and in simple terms, I see it as an outcome of a number of other considerations. Primarily, I believe it is a measure of an individual's reach divided by the number of high trust relationships (see circle diagram above) times voice...something like this:

If influence directly impacted by the ebb and flow of trust within an individual's network, it it's important to note that influence is also somewhat fluid and relative. And all of this is already measured as a factor of time.

The sticky challenge is measuring the level of trust individuals have within their network. The truth is this: As outsiders, we can only gauge an individuals relationship on a trust spectrum based on a myriad of attributes, including length of relationship, messaging frequency, physical relationship, public/private discourse, "lists", discussion topic(s), sentiment, recent events, real-world connection and other complex and sometimes esoteric factors. In the end, some of this data will be available and some will not. As such, the outcome is somewhat likely to be somewhat subjective...depending on the time frame reviewed, quantity and amount of information analyzed (etc.).

What do you think?

The Portable Network & Social Media Loyalty

2009-08-05T23:27:00.011-04:00

I've been thinking about brand loyalty and social media lately, specifically related to some of the changes to features and interfaces that have shown up lately on Facebook and Twitter.

Looking back, Amazon became the 800 lb. gorilla of ecommerce through performance and usability. They set many new standards for online shopping... facilitating simple tasks with superior usability and capabilities. This drove incredible customer loyalty, in turn. In contrast -- with social media -- performance and usability seem to take a back seat on many sites and services today, and there seems to be no overt linkages in this area with customer loyalty.

If you get analytical about it, most social media tools and sites do only a moderate job of creating really ergonomic, usable experiences for people... yet they continue to thrive and grow at astonishing rates. As end users, we battle performance lags, the "Fail Whale" and grapple with the learning curve of using new tools. Jumping through these hoops can be frustrating, yet we continue to adopt... we use these tools, promote our presences on them, and even promote the brands themselves.

Why? Perhaps we're more patient with experimentation and failure because the tools are free. Maybe it's because we know these tools are charting some untested waters... Perhaps we're more patient because many of us are experimenting and learning on some level, ourselves. Maybe some users just don't know better.

Whatever the case, this higher threshold for poor experience doesn't explain why people tend to become more loyal to one tool over another (e.g. FriendFeed vs. Twitter), or why people abandon one network for another (e.g. from MySpace to Facebook).

While there are a number of dynamics at play, the simple answer is this: Loyalty may be facilitated by the tool sets themselves, but our loyalty to various tool sets is largely driven by the unique networks we develop within them. In my head, this looks something like this:

After all, it's the people that create the phenomenal experience... the interactions, the intimacy, the engagement, and the content shared and created on the fly, right? That's what we're there for.

Diving deeper, it's easy to note five key factors that influence social media brand loyalty with lay users today (Note - these are not the same factors that influence early adopters...):

The overall size and activity of the channel's network (established user base)
The actual or potential size, significance of the end-user's in-channel network (my network)
The ease of replicating a user's in-channel network within another channel ("portability")
The tools base level of reliability and performance (base level functionality & decent "up time")
The existence of other tools that help alleviate application shortcomings (e.g. Tweetdeck for Twitter)

Collectively, these five factors make it more difficult for competitors to services like Twitter or Facebook to succeed and serve as a deterrent to a more competitive space today. The lead positioning of key services is, in turn reinforced by the exponential growth of leading networks. This is especially true for those applying best practices for the use of open source code, and making APIs accessible in a manner that encourages the organic expansion of the network and increase in in-channel activity.

As a result, the leaders continue to grow exponentially with little competitive threat. At least, it's this way, today.

But with regard to loyalty, I must question whether we stand by these tools because we love them (I'm sure some of us do) or because we have become, in some sense, willing captives of the networks, services and tools to which we subscribe. We've got a little flexibility, but our networks aren't "portable" in the true sense of the term. We don't "own" them -- the services we subscribe to do. Right now, comprehensively managing and controlling our network, groups, tagging, communication preferences today is entirely a tool-based activity. What if that changed?

Sure, we can import our friend lists from various email applications within tools like LinkedIn. We can export our Twitter, Facebook, and email contacts into Friend Feed (although it doesn't always work perfectly). We can communicate from a single channel to multiple, popular channels (e.g. Ping.fm or FriendFeed, Tweetdeck). However, on a grand scale, we can't, for example, take our comprehensive network and apply it across sites, maintaining "tags" for various contacts, groups and other key meta data. We can't plug our networks into other applications, like Microsoft Outlook. We can replicate our network in a few places... but we can't APPLY our network across multiple services. As a whole, our social networks are, with rare exception, poorly integrated - and often fragmented - and holistically clunky to manage. This is especially true for early adopters who may not know the "tricks" many social mediaphytes have mastered.

We can't really take our social network with us -- yet!

Looking forward, I see a day when all the people we know are united in a seamless way; Where our social network follows us seamlessly from channel-to-channel; Where we are fully in control of how and to whom we communicate across channels; Where our entire social network can be controlled from a single destination, with robust privacy controls -- and even identity management and monitoring services built in; Where we are able to establish communication groups permanently or on-the-fly to control communication based on theme, topic, relationship and other factors; Where our social network is fully integrated with our real-life network - across channels, devices, the cloud and even desktop applications. This will usher in an era where our personal networks take on a much for more useful, meaningful, tangible, connected warmth that reaches across online channels to drive real world communication and activity.

In this future, a better Facebook - or a better "Twitter" - might readily thrive, because there is no "penalty" for leaving. There is also no barrier to activating oneself within a new network or service - because re-establishing and redundantly managing one's social network within each tool will not be required. Our networks become stronger, more integrated, and we're better able to communicate to groups based on relationship, topic, intention, focus, group and other key criteria.

This isn't a pipe dream - we're partially there now. I'd say Facebook, Google have the current upper hand, but FriendFeed, Linked In and Microsoft are obviously moving, too... The day is still young, and there's room for other companies out there to play in this space. It won't be easy - there are many practical and technological hurdles as well as practical challenges in gaining critical mass that are too complex to discuss here.

One giant issue in this will be building user trust and preserving confidentiality and user privacy. Missteps in this area may represent the end of some promising tools, and are probably inevitable. This will probably be a good thing because it will raise awareness and hopefully, lead to the establishment of new industry standards for social privacy management.

In the end, it's not likely to be one -- but perhaps several companies that will make our networks truly portable. The ones that accomplish this successfully will reap a windfall in the form of usage, adoption, data, IP, usage insight, power and profit.

And, when the network becomes portable, loyalty triggers will shift - along with social media business models.

In the future, It won't really matter what users subscribe to ... because it will be easier for users to be, in a sense, omnipresent, traveling at-will to use the "best" features of various tools, sites and services at-will. People may not migrate away from "favorite" sites like Twitter and Facebook - as they seem to be hitting critical mass. However, people will be more likely to have a highly redundant presence across various social media sites, tools, networks and communities.

While this may be great for the user, it will be an uncomfortable reality for social media business. It's likely that we'll see a shakeout within the social media categories ensue, as some players fail, and other sites and tools partner, engage in acquisitions and mergers with other companies -- just like the .com and portal years. Membership numbers will be overshadowed by data that shows either a high level of "in-channel" user engagement - or the creative ability to market directly to individuals (Cost-per-individual marketing) themselves. As users become more active across an array of sites and tools, competition for eyeballs and clicks will increase, making effective advertising a more challenging prospect. Profit models for sites and networks will change with an emphasis on fee-for-service. While free services will continue to exist, we'll see more sites charging for "premium" access. Fee for use and micro-transactions will also play an important role.

To justify fees - user experience will again take center stage, as users will demand highly ergonomic, seamless experiences with full features and functionality. Social media sites, networks, tools and channels will become more important for their features, performance and functionality (like Amazon was) rather than their ability to provide us with access and control over an in-channel network.

When the smoke clears and the frenzy of social media tool proliferation dies down, we'll see different loyalty drivers at play. In the end, the winners will be the ones focused heavily on serving customer needs, providing a well integrated experience, preserving privacy and identity and providing outstanding performance. Privacy will take center stage as the public becomes more ardently concerned about the data available in the cloud. Customer loyalty will belong to proven trust agents...rather than ruddy pioneers.

These 'aint your momma's channels

2009-07-21T13:22:00.011-04:00

Leveraging the same, tired traditional media tactics within emerging channels is like trading in a mule for a Ferrari - and then attempting to bridle it, saddle it, and ride it home while sitting on the roof.

It boggles the mind that a lot of companies actually do this. However, it's an all to common occurence. In my experience, it seems that the ones that behave in this manner are also the same brands that seem to be experimenting in new channels in a way that may be hazardous to brand health.

I've been thinking about this and there are a number of reasons this may be occuring... some more lame than others. Please add your own in the comments.

1. We didn't know what we were signing up for.
Truth be told, many of us have been caught off guard, but that's no excuse. There's enough information out there to test the waters of emerging channels in an intelligent manner. If you're still being caught with your pants down on say, Twitter -- the lack of preparation is your fault -- not a result on an untested medium.

I tend to agree with Jeremiah Owyang's assertion that Twitter will become a CRM tool. I'd submit that we should be thinking about all emerging - or "agile" channels like we would think about CRM tools. This is important because the transparency created by emerging media naturally demand the resolution of key, customer-facing issues. This entails a unique mix of customer service, operational and/or IT skills, and a little PR... although some issues may be related to larger, operational challenges.

Many stakeholders assigned to digital and social media just don't have the level of empowerment or create resolution or influence change at a level that might be necessary. When people are not empowered to answer and resolve tough customer questions in a timely manner in emerging media channels, it becomes highly evident to the brands social newtork.

Unfortunately, instead of resolving this problem with better oversight, coordination and collaboration, many companies react by moving customer facing issues solely offline and manage the digital channels in a more opaque, non-relational manner: Treating the channels as outbound communications vehicles, rather than customer service medium, and limiting individual engagement with customers online. This is a huge mistake.

Emerging media channels need structure and oversight -- but not at the expense of neutering the channel - or of applying common sense. Having thinking workers at the helm who can provide carefully worded and high enough level responses to diffuse risk, and make participants feel valued and respected are essential to keep the "flow" going in favor of the brand. Analysis paralysis is the enemy in what I'm starting to call "translucent culture" (Thanks to @bethharte brain hockey and comment). It's important to find the balance between enough structure to keep things manageable -- and enough flexibility to facilitate agile response.

2. We didn't come along willingly
I've talked to executives from a few major brands who feel they have far too many, vocal detractors and skeletons in the closet to succeed in the use of digital and social media. In fact, the head of customer analytics for a major airline laughingly described Twitter to me as "Pandora's Box" late last year. Many are hesitant to expose present business realities to a broad audience base. Others don't know if they want the exposure something like a blog, Twitter, Facebook or You Tube might create because they might just have more to lose than to gain. Some, frankly, feel social media engagement is a huge waste of time. The point is simple: digital and social media are simply not a priority to everyone.

At the same time, many reticent companies (including the airline I mentioned) have become active in emerging channels anyway. Why? In some cases, a high level executive mandate was issued. In other cases, they were pushed hard by consultants, agencies, industry analysts and overzealous agencies. In some, they merely wanted to reserve user names ... and things cascaded from there.

Whatever the case, the activity of these brands doesn't indicate a fully sponsored, well organized presence. It doesn't indicate alignment, or buy in. It doesn't suggest the individuals managing the digital media presence entered with an understanding of the potential up-side of participation, what they might be in for, or knowing how to manage things, well. It doesn't mean proper resources were allocated to doing social media the right way. Perhaps they came in kicking and screaming, and they're still reeling as they figure things out. This might be more common than you think.

3. The wrong people are steering!

A lack of executive understanding, oversight and/or leadership of emerging channels
Poor interdepartmental alignment and coordination of the emerging media presence

Unempowered or unskilled individuals managing (and advising) the social web

These are bad things. Why? Because the lack of leadership and oversight are plainly evident to every bright individual within a brand's social network.

Case in point -- I recently audited the tweets and posts of a national brand that is a former client. I was disheartened to find the brand's formerly engaging, relational tweets and posts replaced by self-promotional, broadcast-driven messages, with no sign of interaction. I reached out to my contact to ask what happened.

My contact reluctantly and apologetically confessed to me that the team was swamped and decided to pass the management of emerging media channels for the summer to an intern. After sucking in my breath to temper my response, we discussed the ramifications of their decision in rather frank terms. They assured me they'd turn things around. They certainly know better, and I hope they do get it right.

Another interesting aspect to this story is that their executive management doesn't know any better and hasn't challenged the team on this approach. The executives think it's enough for the brand to be present on Facebook, Linked In, Twitter and blogs - so there's no pressure to engage or do anything differently ... no urgency to remedy the issue. It's important to understand that being present in emerging channels isn't the same as having a meaningful presence. Meanwhile, there are a myriad of constituents who have befriended this brand online who were hoping for more than a press release.

This is just one tiny case study that demonstrates the points above. This brings me to the this next point:

4. We jumped in with both feet, but had no plan
It's easy to engage in digital and social media channels without a lot of forethought or up-front planning. This happens more than we might think -- especially in light of a strong internal executive push. However, make no mistake -- digging in one's heels and jumping in with reckless abandon can result in just that -- reckless abandonment. More than a few companies have been forced to refocus or retrench to properly manage customer communication in emerging channels, and in many instances, transparency was not a friend of the brand.

When there's no plan in place that helps companies manage the digital footprint, build relationships, align resources, govern communication, oversee communication and monitor reputation and feedback, the presence becomes unmanageable, difficult to monitor, coordinate and measure. Unfortunately, many brands don't know enough to create a cohesive governance, workflow and management plan. Further, many of their agencies - while active promoters of digital and social media -- are unskilled and untested in the channels, themselves. So, the brands continue on auto-pilot, learning as they go -- often in an inefficient and unsustainable manner.

5. We are really MOST comfortable doing what we KNOW...
Preach all you want about the benefits of digital and social media. Train your team on channel best practices and how to build a successful network. Just remember this: these lessons are easily forgotten in light of a hectic schedule, competing priorities and the unanticipated number of hours it takes to manage the emerging media presence. Business stakeholders may fail to apply their training and revert to more "familiar" tactics. While these may vary from company-to-company, or even department-to-department... you might see the status quo in action, in the form of the following:

Working around problems, rather than fixing them
Resorting to spin, rather than engaging and managing meaningful conversation
Focus on broadcast "push" messages, rather than building relationships
Slapping constraints on the use of new channels, rather than harnessing opportunities
Staying within the "silo" rather than working cross-functionally to meet customer needs

This isn't the kind of culture successful brands want to reflect to the critical public in emerging channels. This is another reason sticking to a plan, putting in proper oversight, and investing in continuous learning and reputation monitoring (read comments on this post, too!) are critical for success.

It's time for a Reality Check!

Sooner or later, the smoke clears and you won't fool anyone. For the brands that suffer from one or more of the symptoms above... take heart. You don't need to hold up mirrors and a smoke machine to mitigate risk and create positive impressions in emerging channels. It's time to get real about your digital media footprint, and the impression it gives.

Your degree of preparedness is evident to customers online. While some executive leaders may not know the difference between being present and having a presence -- your customers will. Don't need to treat emerging channels like broadcast media - and don't allow ignorant people to narrow the emerging media presence so much, their potential is nullified. You need the right approach, commitment, tools, tactics, communication, expectations and management. That requires education by specialists who understand these channels.

Applying old marketing tactics to emerging media channels is abuse - it hurts your brand, your customers and subverts dynamic channels. This doesn't work in anyone's best interest. These channels work best for building relationships, fostering dialog, promoting good will and generating brand advocacy. Winners know this and adapt!

The truth is -- everybody's watching - and waiting, to see if you'll evolve in to a semi-transparent, customer-centric company, or stay stuck in the stone age. If you don't - people may shift to a brand who does adapt.

You can make digital and social media your friend.
The writing is on the wall. While medium of communication has never replaced other medium of communication, new channels do trigger consolidation and impact use and investment. While we still have signs, print, the phone, and recorded music... we also have television, video, video-on-demand and networked computing. New mediums and channels will continue pave the way to the future of interaction while the old channels continue to serve their perhaps more limited purpose. It's important to remember that emerging channels can work against us, becoming an enemy when they are ignored, abused, poorly managed or misunderstood. My advice? Make them your friends, instead!

For a lot of brands, it's time to work harder to refocus and rebuild what may be a shaky foundation. It's okay. It's still early. Most of us are very forgiving... and often forgetful of past mistakes. After all, we've all made mistakes - especially in the online medium. We all face challenges! Want an honest example? This site design has outgrown its purpose... I'm working on a redesign between client obligations... and I can't move this along fast enough.

Developing a digital presence that matters is so important -- much more than spin, or hype or words. Your dedication to customers and improving the business will translate across the social web in a manner that reinforces trust and builds brand affinity. Companies just have to ditch that saddle, and learn to drive!

Authentic isn't always good.

2009-07-15T14:00:00.012-04:00

The last few posts have outlined some thoughts on the subject of Transparency. This generated some input from a few friends on the issue of "Authenticity."

One buddy stressed how important it is to demonstrate authenticity within emerging channels - specifically within social media. I thought about this a little, and I have a slightly different take on the matter.

I think we're already seeing a ton of authenticity in emerging media. For the observant, social media makes it relatively easy to piece together a somewhat realistic view of what goes on - or the thinking of various people and brands.

The problem is, not all of it is authentically good. There are a ton of people and companies being real out there. I'm not sure people always want to see real... because sometimes, reality bites!

Hey, Cool Thought Leader: I don't want to find out you work in your momma's attic in your boxers and eating Cheetos as you crank out amazing insight. I'd rather have the illusion of a casual professional in an internet cafe or something.
Hey, "Expert": I don't want to hear you yapping constantly about how great you are - or telling me to find out for myself by buying your sensational eBook for just $29.95. If you're that great, lemme hear it from others.
Hey, Big Company: It's nice that you're fighting hunger in Africa with your $20 million dollar donation ... but you just laid off 5,000 American workers. :-(
Hey, Huge Brand: I don't want to know that your social media outreach is being run by interns who love Gossip Girl, reality television and clubbing.

Seriously, some of what we're seeing is authentically bad stuff ... authentically ego-centric...authentically self-serving garbage. Further, too much reality can be a bad thing. We don't need more of this.

Without a doubt, we all love authentic good: Especially when it's not misleading or a smoke screen for the bad; Especially if it involves daisies, puppies and children. Authentically good stuff makes people feel better about interacting with you or your brand. It brings them back for more, and encourages them to tell others about your greatness.

At the same time, there are probably some authentically bad aspects of each one of us that might be better left unseen... or dare I say it -- repented of and remedied! ;-)

In the end, I'm sticking to my assertion that in emerging channels, people only want a level of insight into you that makes them feel more secure and confident investing themselves as your friend. (Note: Investment = giving you their time, attention, follows, engagement, recommendations, ranking, referrals, sharing your content, purchasing, etc.)

Strike this balance and you're off to a great start.

Make Transparency Your Friend

2009-07-14T13:08:00.002-04:00

In my last post, I tried to define this notion of "transparency" as context for a few other posts. Smart companies understand that emerging channels demand a greater level of openness and transparency than we have historically provided to customers. They embrace the pressure to perform well in highly visible channels - using it as impetus to identify broken aspects of customer experience and fix things -- rather than continue the way they always have. They recognize the opportunity these channels present to serve customer needs, build stronger relationships and strengthen brand affinity.

A number of brands do this well today. On Twitter alone, it's easy and fun to engage with brands like @zappos @comcastcares , @southwestair @virginamerica @dell and others. Check out Best Buy CMO Barry Judge's blog and the activities at both My Starbuck's Idea and Best Buy's Idea Exchange for crowd-sourcing and customer co-creation. None of these brands claim they get it right all the time. But when they do mess up, it's refreshing to them say, say "Hey - sorry we messed up!" "We're learning." "Here's what we're doing about this problem." and "Here's how we'll make it right.". It's awesome to talk to companies who embrace responsibility as they work to help create satisfied customers. For these companies, transparency is a friend.

Unfortunately, conpanies like these are still the exception, rather than the rule in most emerging media channels. The truth is, many companies who have become active in social media (blogging, twitter, facebook, etc.) will privately admit to being terrified of having an increased level of transparency with customers.

While it's natural to have a healthy fear of increased exposure, some companies become so preoccupied with looking transparent and authentic, they lose focus completely. In an effort to use these channels to generate PR and spin, they may fail to engage as the medium demands: becoming more open and accessible; harnessing the power of the tools to bolster service and support; building relationships and driving brand advocacy. For these companies, transparency becomes the enemy.

We don't need to mention names ... Do a quick audit yourself of the posts, tweets and status updates of a few major brands. It doesn't take more than a page or two to figure out who's really tapped in to their network and who is not. Check for dialog. Check for responses, and look at how the posts are worded. Is there conversation? Resolution? Are they broadcasting 140 character versions of press releases? Do you feel like you're being force fed a marketing campaign in tiny little chunks? Are they attempting to buy followers? Are they focused on quality interactions? Do you recognize people? Does the chatter seam meaningful? It's pretty easy to tell where the brand is at. Next, ask yourself: "Would I follow this brand?" If you wouldn't -- take note of why and remember it.

This isn't just about corporations, but the agencies that serve them, as well. Ad Age did a fantastic piece this week highlighting the hypocrisy of agencies promoting Twitter. And that's just scratching the surface of a pandemic of agency hypocrisy in emerging media. In many cases, the lights are on, but nobody's home.

What surprises me is how easily companies and agencies forget that people don't necessarily want to have love affairs with brands. In truth, people care really care most about themselves and having their needs met. They care about being heard, and responded to. They want to feel valued and recognized. They want to know others care. They often seek relationships with other people who make them feel good about themselves. They love brands because they meet and exceed their expectations. These tools pose tremendous opportunity to meet those needs. However, it seems some companies think just being present is "good enough".

To be clear, being present in social media is not the same as establishing an effective presence. Broadcasting messages en mass within intimate digital channels isn't going to win coveted relationships. Shucking off customer issues, suggestions and recommendations isn't going to win friends. Ignoring people or their comments, is in fact is going to alienate customers and prospects. Yet it's happening all over within emerging media channels... as the world watches. For companies who do this -- transparency is your enemy.

Customers can see exactly where the heart of the brand lies by the focus, content and intention of their emerging media content. It's okay to approach these channels with caution... but the world is watching. Don't just stand there and spin... engage, provide service, add value, meet needs, co-create and give back. Turn that ship around and give people something positive and remarkable to discuss!

The Illusion of Transparency

2009-07-13T17:26:00.007-04:00

There's a lot of talk in marketing and social media circles today about the concept of "transparency." I use the term myself -- usually when trying to explain the impact of digital and social media to my clients. These technologies tend to expose the soft underbellies of our companies, by providing customers with greater visibility and more intimate knowledge of our brands, employees, products, services and operations. As a result, we are forced to work in a more transparent manner to address customer needs across a spectrum of online and offline channels.
That makes a bit of sense, I hope.

The problem is, the way most people are using the word "transparent" in this medium today feels terribly inauthentic to me -- as if we will all become as clear as glass, someday. The truth is, while these new channels force us to be more transparent, we will always seek a degree of opacity. Call it a fig leaf to cover our nakedness; a closet for our skeletons; or an illusion of transparency.

Will we ever become truly transparent? I think not. We've all got some damage; some ugly we're trying to hide. We've all got things that need to be fixed. Stuff that perhaps it's better others do not see. Do we want everyone to know our business? Nope.

So when we use the term transparent, what we're really striving for is balance -- creating an acceptable level of honest visibility for customers, which makes us more real and more accessible to them. This helps customers understand our plight as we attempt to service their needs, while providing enough opacity to shield us from over exposure.

Sounds a bit like dating, to me.

What do you think?

I'm going to write a bit more about companies that fight transparency in my next post. Stay tuned.

10 Tips for Twitter Unmarketing

2009-04-14T13:22:00.003-04:00

As a follow up to the DiGiorno Pizza Critique, I spent a little time thinking about other types of marketers and created a revised post called "10 Tips for Twitter UnMarketing." You can find it here and add your .02 cents.

If you are curious about the title, I'm just not a real fan of the term "Social Media Marketing." I realize it's the hot buzz word - but it makes me uncomfortable. Maybe it's just semantics. I don't know.

We are migrating from the post industrial product-centric organizational model that is heavily task-focused -- to post millenial people-centric models that are customer focused (all tasks wrapped around the customer). It's a revolution that is happening at the pace of an evolution -- and can be awkward and painful as companies walk through the change. Perhaps that's why so many companies find delivering great experiences an elusive goal.

In the wake of this change, marketing is undergoing important shifts. Entirely new skill sets are required. Channel proliferation is happening at light speed. The way we go to market is different -- sometimes less expensive but often much more challenging to manage. Our dialog has changed. Marketing today is MUCH less about pushing an agenda and message through aggressive outbound communications, programs and campaigns. Today, it is MUCH MORE about delivering the experience fundamentals, being excellent and remarkable -- and helping people discover us by building authentic relationships, by allowing others to "taste and see" -- by experiencing.

So that's why I used the term "Un Marketing." This isn't about marketing. It's about customer experience.

While I write about a lot of "stuff," my focus has been on creating great dialog with customers, and designing creating great experiences that are people focused. Social media fits in because it's a rapidly growing, dynamic experience tool. It's important to pay attention to what's going on and learn from specialists , (I don't like the term "expert either) who are actively engaged in various aspects of social media.

I can't thank you enough for your comments, tweets, DMs, IMs and emails. Please keep them coming!

DiGiorno Tweets: Tips for Twitter Campaigns

2009-04-09T10:18:00.014-04:00

Ad age reported today that Kraft/Digiorno Pizza and Weber Shandwick PR have teamed on the launch of Digiorno's new Flatbread Pizzas. Digiorno will deliver free pizzas to tweetups in LA, New York and Chicago. The Twitter component is part of a national launch involving print and television. The announcement highlights the brand's plans to reach out to "influential" tweeters.

Okay - I think this is a GREAT idea. Tweeters are vocal, fiercely loyal and when you get us together, it's even better. Get a great idea out - make us love your product and we'll push the good news up the flagpole. We love brands that love us, and nothing says love like schwag, food and conversation! Yay!

The thing is, there seem to be quite a few challenges with execution here that are worth highlighting. To ensure success, here's some Live Path advice for any brand planning a campaign with a Twitter-driven social media component like DiGiorno:

Define "influence" in advance. The Digiorno There's no definition of what "influence" is. I find it hard to believe they'll be launching this without that definition in place. The article eludes to number of followers - but any veteran on twitter will attest to the sheisters out there who have numbers but LITTLE dialog or influence. Brands should look at followers against the backdrop of other elements, like overall voice (on Twitter and other social networks), reach (comments, re-tweets, links in), affiliations (e.g. social media club, DMA, others) and activity (travel, conferences, speaking where word may be spread).
Establish Your Angle(s). Beyond influence and geography, it's important to think about specialization/demographic. Social Media makes it easy to target individuals with specific areas of influence. Walmart and 800-FLOWERS are just two brands that have actively targeted Mommy Bloggers. I'm friends with a few of the Walmart 11 moms - and a few have frugal living columns. SXSW featured a panel with Chris Brogan and others called "Dad is the New Mom." I have a fun cadre of foodies in my Tweetdeck group. It's important to define the angle you're going to "shoot from" for "focused tweets." For example, for Digiorno, I would ask the following: Is your angle economics, making mom or dad's life easier, or great tasting pizza... or all of the above. Choose a mix that matters most to generate the best word-of-mouth!
Challenge Geographical Constraints. Don't assume you'll find the best and most influential tweeters for your brand will be found in LA, New York and Chicago - there are plenty of active, chatty hubs in other areas of the country, as well. If your product is aces for middle-american housewives - go get 'em! Targeting is not dead -- in fact it's even easier with social media.
Make it Easy to Get Involved. The article on Ad Age provides no way for people to engage with Digiorno. There's no page on the website - no available URL that details the new program. What happens if an influential tweeter reads this and says "I have an influential tweetup this week! I want Pizza!!" How do they make their case to Kraft? At a minimum, brands should offer a web page with details and criteria. Better yet -they're wise to add some comment functionality to the announcement page, allowing people to nominate themselves or their events in a visible way to others.
Tweet Unto Others. There's not one Twitter profile listed in the Kraft/Weber article on Ad Age. Furthermore, after some searching on Twitter, it seems Kraft is relatively unprepared to meet people from a brand perspective on Twitter. (Administering slap to PR agency hand!) This should have been handled before the release is sent out. When I looked on Twitter @kraft pulled up a person's profile with a link to an article about dead man's sperm. Nice! When I looked up @digiorno two accounts were listed -- without any followers, branded icons OR tweets. That's a shame because it's not hard to lay this groundwork. Put up a clever, branded icon. Seed your accounts with some tweets and information- engage some people in dialog on Twitter to create a tweet history in advance of any press releases. Oh - and while I'm on the subject - follow Twitter best practices. Do not use Twitter to BROADCAST your brand message. Simply tell people about the promotion, ask them what they think and create an open line of communication with the twitterverse. Finally, remember that once you are finished with your campaign - you're not finished on Twitter. Develop a plan for how your brand will continue on Twitter after your campaign is over.
Consolidate #Results. Do you want to demonstrate participation and make it easier to track word of mouth and discussion regarding your campaign? Why not create a hashtag to track buzz and centralize dialog about your promotion? It would be relatively easy to give something away for free with a simple request like this: "Participants will merely be asked to include "#digiorno in their tweet updates during the event".
Focus Beyond Tweets. Just because the campaign component is Twitter focused, your scope should not be limited to Twitter alone. You'll want to look at follow-up posts (like this one) and articles on popular sites and blogs - and you should be sure to comment on posts, and respond to tweets, as well. Recognize that everything starts the minute the press release goes out ... and promotion continues as campaigns ensue. "Shout out" the quick wins and results on the fly (e.g. Announced yesterday and 1000 people signed up!) to encourage follow up posts and mentions. Reward the people who volunteer but don't get selected with consolation prizes, like coupons or schwag. Take a page from Dell or Zappos and celebrate success publicly. Publish a post or rich media case study to highlight lessons learned and celebrate success. You don't have to tell all -- just tell enough to communicate success or how you have learned.
Immerse Yourself. Brands that want to foster dialog through campaigns like this should be careful not to miss the boat by acting like an old school marketer in a new media culture. The old models are dead on new media. Social Media Marketing is about , authenticity, relationship and dialog. It's not enough to just send free food or schwag! You must be present. While you can't be everywhere, you can target a few larger events and send a "brand agent"to listen and engage with your influentials. Make sure they fit in with the culture/bias of the group that is meeting. Make sure the agent asks attendees about themselves and what they think. Listen and respond positively. Be authentic, reflect the social media culture (and be sure to tweet remarks from the event yourself!)

I"m sure there's more to say on this topic, but I'm attempting to be brief here. Feel free to add your comments about how to create success with programs like these. Thanks for listening!

The Social Media Engagement Continuum - What Makes an Expert?

2009-04-03T10:50:00.022-04:00

Yesterday, I posted a response to Beth Harte's great post about social media expertise. I highlighted the thought that, rather than accepting an individual's self-proclaimed title of "expert", perhaps it's best to look at people and companies in terms of level of social media engagement and results. I articulated social media engagement along a type of continuum. Taking those thoughts to the next level, here's a more refined, work-in process view:

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(Note - Posted Friday 4/3 - modified Monday 4/6)
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Clueless individuals are in the dark about social media. They may have heard the term, but social media has no impact on their personal life or work. They are not only clueless about social media, they are not actively interested in finding more out about it.

Questioning individuals want to know about social media, starting with gaining a clear definition of what it is. They need a clear picture of the landscape and categories of social media, and an understanding of best-of-breed tools. Questioning individuals are starting to read about social media and may have recently joined some of the more popular social media networks to find out what the fuss is all about.

From a Groundswell perspective, "Inactives " fall above this line:

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"Joiners" fall below:

Scouting (Updated 4/6 formerly called "Experimenting") individuals are testing the waters of several social media networks or tools to determine the benefits or application they may have for life and/or work. With esoteric goals in mind, they have joined a number of networks and are contributing sporadically to dialog and discussion. They are reading case studies and researching social media in addition to expanding their use of social media tools and applications. They do not have a significant network online.

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From a Groundswell perspective, Collectors, Critics and Creators start here.

Active individuals are vigorously using (and contributing to) at least five social media applications, networks or tools on a daily basis for work or pleasure. They aren't newbies by any stretch of the term. They have been entrenched in a base level of networks as active users for at least six months. Critical tools must include contributing to one or more blogs, having a presence on at least one major social network the use of social bookmarking or life streaming applications as well as the use/uploading to media sharing sites or rich media destinations.

Active individuals are gaining practical knowledge of social media, and a very clear understanding of how social media changes the way we live and work. They are quick to sign up and test new social technologies, in an attempt to perfect the suite of tools they use for work and life. They are exploring new social media tools and reading actively about social media, measurement, influence, case studies. They are building a social media network and fostering new relationships and dialog every day.

Immersed individuals exhibit the traits of an active user -- only across a much larger array of social media networks, sites and tools. Immersed users have a strong reason to be highly active in social media, usually for professional reasons. They may be actively promoting their brand or business in social media, serve as a community or service manager, manage social media within their organization, or serve as an active consultant, teacher or thought leader in the arena. Whatever role they assume, the use of social media networks, sites and tools is a critical core function of their work day. They understand the categories of social media and how tools can be applied inside and outside the firewall for both B2B and B2C and various types of businesses. They can readily share stories and case study information related to the work they've done that is useful and relevant.

Immersed users are also active contributors in the networks within which they participate. They are actively engaged in ongoing discussion and dialog. They contribute unique content and insight in their areas of expertise in the form of blog posts, articles, white papers, and other media, which is validated and supported by peers and contemporaries. Immersed users have very strong digital footprint, with substantial social networks and following. They also pull up easily within Google - and may be recognized within the field by other notable users.

Influential individuals exhibit all of the characteristics of Active and Immersive users and posses extensive, demonstrable experience working with an array of social media applications and tools. They may have experience developing social media applications, tools and sites. Influentials are active in developing and applying social media in professional environments with the specific goal of shaping the way we work, live and interact with brands. They may work within social media companies, or represent social media tools in a consulting or agency capacity to an array of recognizable clients.

Influentials have a significant amount of experience applying social media tools to drive specific results. They understand the myriad of technologies that can be used to solve client/customer challenges, the integration and operational complexities of using social media and when it may be appropriate to develop something custom vs. out-of-the box. They can readily produce tangible examples of the work they have done in social media through company or client examples, case studies or demonstrations.

It's significant to note that some influentials may have very deep, specialized knowledge of specific "categories" of social media or specific tools or networks themselves. At the same time, a true influential has his/her finger on the pulse of the arena and can speak authoritatively about the application of various tools in a number of enterprise environments, holding their own with inquiring analysts and venture capitalists.

Influentials do not wield influence for the reasons described by "follow bots" and social media grader/recommendation engines. While they do leave a hefty digital footprint and sport an impressive number of followers -- this speaks to the fact that they are authoritative in their area of expertise and have something remarkable to say. Influentials are highly engaged each day with a network of other immersed and influential people who are busy working within social media in a variety of capacities. This network strengthens their ability to do great work and serves as a lifeline of information on developments in social media.

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SO! Just thinking out loud!

Curious minds want to know.... Do you feel these categories are accurate and representative of the types of folks you encounter in social media? Where do you fall in the social media continuum? Where does your company fall? Tell me your thoughts. I'm sure I'll be updating this soon enough!

Blog Talk, Webinars & Redesigns, Oh My!

2009-04-01T12:10:00.003-04:00

This Friday at 12:30 pm, I'll be interviewed by John Munsell and Paul Chaney on the User Friendly Thinking Show on Blog Talk Radio. The topic of our discussion will be customer experience management - demystifying the term, talking about the move to customer centricity is driving business change and how CEM will impact business and your job in the future. I really hope you'll join us, and look forward to talking to folks in Q&A. Click here for the link to the Blogtalk radio program!

This discussion will serve as a teaser into my upcoming Marketing Profs Premium Webinar on Customer Experience Management, which will be held on April 30th. The webinar is free for individuals with Premium Mprofs membership (It's low-cost, high value. I'm a Member!), and you can also pay for the webinar itself. We'll take a deeper dive and have visuals for this discussion. Click here for the link to April 30th Marketing Profs Webinar on CX with yours truly!

In between paying client gigs and crazy projects, I'm working on a redesign of the Live Path site and Experience Architect Weblog. Stay tuned for more... I'm aware of my usability hypocrisy on the blog now, and glad that most of you feel the content is worth the read, regardless of the crowded UI! Thanks for engaging with me.

Can't Buy Me Love - The truth about CEM

2009-03-20T12:38:00.011-04:00

In the course of attending the SXSW conference, I had the pleasure of listening to the amazing Kathy Sierra speak. In her session, "Making Breakthroughs Happen" she asked the audience to consider our clients or customers and try to answer the question "If your customers were living a movie, what movie would that be?"

The question stimulated a lot of chatter. I was instantly stumped, as the ever saucy Valeria Maltoni quipped "I don't know WHAT movie - but it would be a scary one!" Hoover's Tim Walk decided on Glenngary Glenn Ross and highlighted the high pressure sales situations some of his clients are in. Before Lauren Vargas could speak (I'm sorry Lauren), I blurted out the movie title that had invaded my brain -- even though it made no sense at the time. As we explored it, we were intrigued by the association. The movie was Can't Buy me Love.

For those who haven't seen it, or don't recall, Can't Buy Me Love is a 1987 hit teen sensation starting Patrick Dempsey as Ronald Miller. Ronald is an awkward, lawn mowing nerd who is sick of being unpopular as he enters his Senior year. Capitalizing on a personal crisis, he successfully convinces the very pretty, popular, lead cheerleader Cyndi Mancini to be his boyfriend for one month, in exchange for $1000. They get off to an awkward start, but as Cyndi begins to work on Ronald, a friendship ensues. Ronald's popularity soars through his association with Cyndi and she truly begins to develop romantic feelings for him. However, new found popularity causes Ronald's head to swell, and he begins to behave badly.

Ronald soon realizes that chasing popularity isn't all it is cracked up to be -- especially as he loses girl he cares for. Toward the end of the film, Ronald has an awakening that speaks to his need for internal change: the need for authenticity, being true to himself, demonstrating character and care for others. This realization prompts a return to the basics for Ronald. In the final scene of the movie, the redeemed Ronald rides off into the sunset on his lawnmower...and Cyndi joins him, perching on the back.

Now, I hadn't seen this movie in eons - and I can't say it was ever in my list of top 80's movies - or even top-of-mind. However, I was a bit surprised by the parallels I noted between this movie and many of the companies I've been exposed to.

Like Ronald, many companies courting customer popularity go out and hire the best and most charismatic to help them in their plight: Expert agencies develop brand plans and multichannel, experiential campaigns filled with promise. Large consultancies support them in purchasing and leveraging the leading CRM and marketing automation tools. As they team with the experts, these companies begin to speak the language of customer centricity. They begin to make adjustments and changes. They also learn some new dance moves, network in new channels (such as social media) and apply spit, shine and polish that can make them more attractive and popular.

This is certainly a start, start, but the action can't stop there - and it often does. For the story to end happily, there must be a moment-of truth that leads to truly redemptive, internal change. True customer is hard work that demands some tough introspection and internal change!

Unfortunately, when it comes to addressing the internal operational, cultural and organizational issues that negatively impact customer centricity, many companies haven't yet turned a corner. When it comes to creating truly seamless, integrated experience, there's often no plan in place, and no executive mandates or alignment to ensure the total experience is being addressed. As a result, the customer experience suffers, relationships are impacted and brand equity suffers.

This isn't just one consultant's opinion. Consider this data extrapolated from Forrester Research, Strativity and Destination CRM, reflecting input from senior executives at Fortune 100/500 firms:

83% of companies have no executive tasked with improving customer experience across channels
74% have No single set of customer performance scores applied across the organization
73% claim that customer experience is not well defined & communicated
71% do not meet with customers regularly (DOH!)
76% say employees are not well-versed in how to delight customers.
71% believe employees do not have tools and authority necessary to solve customer problems
Less than 44 % believe their companies deserve customer loyalty
About 42% say their product/service is not worth the price they charge

What's ironic about this data is that, between 82-85% of the same executives agree that Customer Experience is the next competitive battleground!

(Go figure!)

Taking a look at how companies stack up, perhaps this inconsistency is the reason MOST organizations fall horribly short of customer experience excellence. The fact remains that the problems present in our companies related to culture, operations, strategic planning and programmatic execution are almost always reflected at some level in the the customer experiences we offer.

The message should be clear for us all: We can't buy customer love. It comes only from offering authentically great experiences. This requires really hard work - unglamorous work - but this is also the work that pays off the most in the long-run. Customer centricity is driven out of organizations that truly understand and engage with their audience, deliver operational excellence, support an open, responsive culture and drive customer-centric collaboration from the top-down. In short, they are agile, transparent, creative, responsive and engaged, and they deliver consistently solid, positive experience.

Perhaps it's time for your company to have a Ronald Miller experience. It wasn't an easy journey - and it involved a fair amount of humiliation. Realigning an organization from a silo-driven, product-focused culture to a truly customer-focused alignment isn't for the faint of heart. It requires solid, cross-organizational top-down leadership, dedication to knocking down organizational and collaborative barriers, appropriate strategic planning, a transformation in the culture and a better orchestrated and collaborative enterprise. However, at the end of the story, it's the heroes that take on this work that will ride off into the sunset with the customer.

Bait and Twitch?

2009-02-07T15:23:00.021-05:00

Twitter has become a highly valuable network for me, both professionally and personally. I believe it's one of many game changers out there - which is why I am excited to show my clients the tool, help them understand it, and determine whether it is right for their business. The service is growing by leaps and bounds and, as it does, a whole new genre of etiquette is developing related to the use of the tool emerges. However, with the good, comes the bad...

I was talking to Allen Weiss on Saturday about a disturbing trend I've noticed. Individuals who:

Follow Me
Wait for me to follow back
Send me a DM thanking me for the follow (using a bot)
Immediately unfollow me.

These folks are playing an age old game with a new Twitter name I decided to call "Bait and Twitch," and this behavior ALWAYS results in an immediate unfollow from me.

"Twitchers" (the name I gave them Saturday) follow people only to build up a large follower base. They use follow bots to send Direct messages thanking people for following them, but the reality is this: Once they are "followed back" their primary course of action is to unfollow the people who reciprocate. This frees them up to go lure more unsuspecting Tweeters into the "follow me" game. They'll follow anyone, but especially folks with a high number of followers and/or a high Twitter grade...in an attempt to get a free ride on the "influence" of others (Don't get me started on what influence is...that's another topic entirely).

What then? Well, I'm assuming they then brag about how many people are following them and how great they are.

Basically, Twitchers are a huge waste of time and fall into league with other people I find "Twepulsive" (I am addicted to twitter naming things), including:

Porn Spammers
Junk-Clicky Sales people
Anyone bragging about being a "Guru", "Expert" or "Maven"
Mediums, Psychics and Intuitives
SEO, Social Media Snake Oil Salespeople
Overzealous “life” coaches
Anyone aggressively pushing an MLM Business
Anyone touting "Get Rich Now" or "Make Big Money" schemes
People who claim to "Know the SECRET to..." anything
Tweeters who use Magpie to broadcast ads

I also tend to steer clear of people with:

No avatar or avatars with sleazy pictures
No bio or link information on their profile page
Cheesy/poorly done twitter backgrounds trying to sell something/someone
People who HABITUALLY TYPE IN ALL CAPS
Pushy or radical extremists of about any ilk

And I am also shy about folks whose tweet streams seem:

Too new
Too shallow
Overly self-promotional
Reminiscent of a one-way broadcast (no dialog)
Full of repeat tweets or repeated promotions for the same link/site

To be fair, I don't follow back everyone who follows me. Sometimes I wait to see what people have to say and follow back later. Sometimes, I don't follow at all (see above). When I do find someone I find interesting, it's nice to follow each other reciprocally... However, I understand that not everyone I follow will follow in turn. Some of the folks I follow (@dooce for example, who has 44,000+ followers!) just can't keep up with little old me. That's fine. For the most part, however, the folks I follow on Twitter typically follow me in return...

So, as I attempt to build this network of interesting, stimulating, funny and thought provoking tweeps... I will shun the Twitchers. I may even call them out, as some repeat offenders emerge! I thought about starting a hashtag for #twitchers, but I can’t help but feel that would just take up MORE time and energy I don't have to expend.

For those of you thinking of unfollowing me, you've gotta do what you've gotta do. For the record, I do attempt to tweet about meaningful and relevant issues... However, I confess that I sometimes engage in some goofy dialog with @marketingprofs, @ambercadabra, @bethharte @acclimedia @kelleycrane @paisano @conniereece and others. I also tweet infrequently about working at home in my PJ's, whine over my need for coffee, my 16 month old son who still doesn't sleep at night, our 18 year old teen, and once or twice about my dog's horrid farting problem (but I'm sorry about that last one).

To better keep up on your network, consider the tips above, and using the many apps and services available for Twitter today. I have found FriendorFollow, MrTweet and TwitterGrader useful. I also use Tweet Deck (although it's a RAM hog) to manage my groups and streams. Got something to share? Post your favorite tools and Twitter peeves below!

2008 Top 25 Companies for Customer Experience

2008-12-17T23:21:00.010-05:00

Forrester just released their Customer Experience Index for 2008. The study surveyed 4,500 people and asked them to rank 114 companies across 12 industries.

At a high level, the results were relatively sad: Only 11% of companies garnered a rating of "excellent", and 38% percent of firms were rated as “poor” or “very poor.”

This is pretty interesting in a day and age where Harris Research and Forrester say that between 82% and 85% of executives agree that customer experience is critical to competitive advantage and may well be the next competitive battleground over the next three years.

This lackluster performance also suggests an opportunity -- especially if I am correct in repeating a Harvard Business Review claim that a 5% decrease in customer attrition can increase profits by 25%. (Note: I saw that figure and wrote it down and am looking for the specific citation)

What's missing? Well, more than one person or post can cover, but consider this:

If you ask any large company to give you a site map of their website, most could provide one with ease. However, if you asked them to show you a cross-channel experience map that illustrates the "brand journey" for a key customer segment, they'd probably look at you with confusion.

Why does that matter? Well, it could mean a few things. No map may indicate there is no unified or accurate understanding of the actual customer experience that is being delivered. No map may mean there is no truly integrated plan to proactively manage customer experiences across channels. No map may also indicate an inability to unite the vision of leadership with all other "agents of experience" (staff, agencies, third parties, partners, etc.) to drive coordinated execution.

Just consider the incredible channel proliferation we've faced over the past two decades alone. It's enough to make one's head swim. The way we go to market, the way customers shop and the way we all communicate has shifted entirely. As we have attempted to adapt to this raging amount of change, the truth is this: our customer experiences simply evolved over time. Most were never strategically conceived for the environment we live in today...

For the most part, most of today's customer experiences can be likened to a structure that was built one room at a time: The floor plan is a confusing and in places, nonsensical. The many ad-hoc renovations have made the foundation uneven and unstable. Visitors (customers) do their best to navigate the rooms...and sometimes we knock holes in walls to make it easier... but the truth is there are a lot of pitfalls along the way. However, unlike the mansion with only a few doors to the outside -- in real life, our customers can leave easily, whenever they want.

What can we do about this? Well, Forrester has some good recommendations, and I tend to agree with these. In addition to things like employing "Voice of the Customer" programs, leveraging data mining and BI tools and making customer experience a top priority, I'll add my thought that companies need to start with more fully understanding the true customer experience that is being delivered today.

To do this, I'm a proponent of employing interaction design principles to visually map out the customer experiences we deliver. . "Customer experience maps" are visual diagrams that illustrate the customer journey across channels, including the key linkages, programs, services and critical engagement intersections, where customers decide they'll leave you or love you. By engaging in proactive customer experience mapping companies can better understand the true customer experience, identify the pitfalls that damage relationships and fix what's broken. As they do this, they can begin to more proactively manage the experience, correct operational barriers that damage loyalty and better position themselves as listeners and customer advocates.

Getting back to Forrester's Report, Here are the top 25 performers:

1. Barnes & Noble
2. USAA (credit cards)
3. Borders
4. Amazon.com
5. Hampton Inn/Suites
6. BJ’s Wholesale Club
7. Sam’s Club
8. A credit union (bank)
9. Kohl’s
10. Marriott Hotels & Resorts
11. JCPenney
12. Target
13. Old Navy
14. Holiday Inn Express
15. eBay
16. Southwest Airlines
17. Macy’s
18. Apple
19. Costco Wholesale
20. Toys “R” Us
21. USAA (insurance)
22. CVS
23. Holiday Inn
24. Lowe’s
25. Staples

It's worth mentioning that a lot of the companies at the bottom are within industries that are facing financial hardship (e.g. Financial Services industries, Airlines), although not exclusively. It's easy to see how today's market factors can weigh in to customer experience viewing this report...

However, the good news is that even in a down economy, 58% of customers say they'll pay MORE for a better experience (Forrester also). It's time to get tactical on improving customer experience!

Giving a hat tip to Evelyn So Evelyn So for the link to Forrester's free complimentary research report. Enjoy!

Exp File: Shoe Carnival. Watch for Carnies!

2008-12-16T13:46:00.014-05:00

I took a trip to Shoe Carnival in a rare shopping day recently. It turned out to be quite an experience... only in not such a positive way.

It was a quiet Tuesday around noon when I walked into the store. Business was slow, and was the only customer. I walked in to face a large center aisle with smaller shoe aisles branching off to the left and right. Men's shoes were on the left, women's shoes on the right. Children's shoes and clearance items at the back.

It was a pretty standard shoe store, at first glance.

The only other life in the store were two middle age sales guys. As I approached a center display, sales guy #1 quickly approached to ask if I needed help. I thanked him and said that I was just looking. He followed me for a second and reluctantly walked off. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed sales guy #2 eying me from a distance.

As I strolled around the store, the sales guys then began a maneuver I can best describe as "swimming the tank": Taking opposite positions within the store, they began gliding quickly and smoothly around the store and across the aisles. It was like a synchronized dance. They didn't have shoe boxes or inventory in their hands... or any obvious task in mind. It was weird.

As they conducted this coordinated sweep of the store, each one awkwardly passed me several times. When I made eye contact, both returned a rather forced and eager grin. They they were just walking around...watching...staring at ME - the only customer in the store. I began to feel like a single gal at a used car lot -- or a struggling tuna in the center of a shark tank... The whole thing made me feel uneasy.

After a few minutes of this truly bizarre behavior, I it occurred to me that perhaps they thought I was a shoplifter. This thought amused me, and I continued to wander the store - now more fixated on the antics of the sales guys than any of the shoes I saw. However, just when I thought the sales approach could not get much worse, I heard the rattle of an intercom and a very loud announcement that went something like this:

"LADIES!!!! For the next FIIIIIVE minutes only, we're running a special promotion JUST for you! Take FIIIIIVE DOLLARS off your next purchase of ANY pair of LADIES SHOES marked $24.99 or higher - but ONLY when you PURCHASE within the next FIVE MINUTES!"

To my shock, the announcer turned out to be sales guy #1, who passed me at the back of the store as I faced the entrance. He was holding a wireless microphone and he continued with the pitch:

"YES! For LADIES SHOES ONLY, you'll get FIVE DOLLARS OFF each pair marked $24.99 or higher. Ladies Shoes can be found ON THE LEFT SIDE of the store. Remember, to get this incredible deal, REMEMBER it only applies to purchases made within THE NEXT FIIIIIVE MINUTES."

...He then vanished around a corner, but he wasn't done yet. Continuing in a manner I can best describe as a rapid-fire narrative similar to the financial term disclaimers tacked on to the end of car-commercials....

"Please keep in mind that this offer does NOT apply to clearance items and cannot be used with any other special offer."

Now... I like bargains. However, I'm not one for pressure tactics when I'm shopping, and I'm certainly not desperate to save $5 on a pair of shoes. This is especially true when there's a caveat that I MUST find a pair I like, try them on and rush to the register within "FIIIIVE minutes".

In short, I was so turned off, I decided to leave the store. A new customer arrived just before I left. As I passed her, I mentally wished her well.

In retrospect, I realize the reason I don't like Carnivals is not because I don't enjoy thrill rides, games, deals and action. I love the smells of carnivals, and the people and excitement. I like the colors, riding roller coasters, goofing around in fun houses, eating funnel cakes and watching joyful children ride cheezy kiddie rides with cotton candy.

My problem with carnivals is this: I don't like carnival workers. I don't like "Carnies." Now, I mean no offense to any Carnie that may read this post. I am sure there are plenty of very nice, reputable, upstanding and clean Carnies out there, and this doesn't apply to you. Unfortunately, I can only speak only from my own experience, which frankly, may be biased and perhaps tainted by too much television.

For me, the word "Carnie" ushers in the acrid smell of cigarette smoke.... the vision of men with ruddy complexions, missing teeth, mullets, greasy jeans, t-shirts and empty beer bottles...and chubby women with frizzy hair and snug fitting t-shirts. These are people who have had a hard, nomadic life - one that may include a shady background or past incarceration.

The Carnies I have encountered have been mostly creepy. In my minds-eye, I picture a grim, beer bellied Carnie hustling people on to a rickety ride maintained (or controlled) primarily with a greasy wrench ... I also picture slick Carnies luring suckers with a cheap, straw-filled Sponge Bobs: YOURS to WIN!! Just $5 for three throws....Feel the cheapness...the hustle...

It's a bit dramatic, yes. But here's my point:

As an experience architect, it would seem to me that Shoe Carnival, in creating an innovative brick-and-mortar experience would choose to capitalize on some of the more positive aspects of the Carnival environment, rather than the more questionable or negative ones.

Rather than the Carnie-like hard-sell and intimidating sales maneuvers... how about capitalizing on things like the senses: With color, yummy smells, popcorn and music? How about offering easily won games (read: no pressure) that offer the thrill of a bargain? How about driving customer delight with low-pressure service, lighthearted fun and smiles. Maybe balloons for the kids? Based on this incidence, I'd say the Shoe Carnival experience may warrant further examination.

I can't yet say whether my experience matches that offered at all Shoe Carnival's stores, or if mine was an isolated incident. I did some checking and the company has experienced growth and was even ranked by Forbes in November as a solid retail investment. So it can't all be bad.

However, perhaps this type of feedback is something the leadership team at Shoe Carnival should consider as they refine and cultivate a unique in-store experience -- especially as they close a number of stores this year. Location isn't the only key to success... good experience is.

If you've visited Shoe Carnival and have some thoughts, feel free to comment or send it my way.

Intel's Social Media Guidelines - Two Thumbs Up

2008-12-11T01:25:00.004-05:00

Giving a friendly hat tip to my twitter pal, @asfaq for pointing out to me tonight that Intel has a publicly available Social Media policy.

This is quite a contrast to other companies, like Johnson and Johnson, who doesn't yet have a publicly available policy, or set of social media guidelines or policies for their business. However, to be fair, it's harder for any company in pharmaceuticals to publish anything publicly - or to engage in social media due to heavy government regulation and HIPAA.

But I digress. Intel's guidelines are a breath of fresh air!

At a time when so many people are free to point out what companies are doing WRONG in social media, Intel's approach is a great example of doing things right. The policy is really well written and goes beyond what might be considered a "POLICY" document. It's a useful guide on how to engage appropriately in social media to drive success. It's proactive, consultative, helpful and educates people about their responsibility when engaging in social media. They've even got a special email address set up for individuals who have questions.

You can check it out for yourself here.

"Bob" could be any of us.

2008-12-02T12:48:00.002-05:00

Chris Brogan highlights the story of a guy we'll call Bob... a guy trying to do the right thing for a company that can't get on board with social media interaction.

Bob is obviously a guy who cares about being customer-centric. He cares about his products. He cares about being forward thinking... The thing is, Bob could be any of us.

Bob's story illustrates why it's essential for companies to be totally on board before diving in to Social Media experimentation. Once you are out there, you're OUT there... and it's very hard to go back to status quo.

My advice to Bob - Wipe the Dust off your feet and go do what you are doing for the competition!

This is a pretty compelling story... Check it out. Thanks, Chris.

Rapid Response Tumblr Case Study

2008-12-01T22:50:00.005-05:00

Recently I posted some comments on a blog posting on a great post from Critical Mass on Creating a Rapid Response Culture. Today, while catching up with email, I found a comment sent to me from Sandeep at VizEdu, telling me they used my feedback, along with insight from Critical Path's David Armano and Frank Eliason at Comcast to create a small interactive Tumblr case study on rapid response. I thought this was a pretty interesting way What a great way to grab quotes and assemble a visually driven case study. Check it out here or see below:

Gift Lists and Shopping

2008-12-01T11:25:00.004-05:00

Happy Cyber Monday, folks! In the tradition of holiday cheer, I was recently interviewed for this CNN article on the power of gift registries and wish lists. Sadly, I wasn't quoted accurately in the bold portion of this quote:

"Registries provide a retailer with robust data on customer preferences, fuel their marketing ability and extend their reach to a new audience via gift buyers," says Leigh Duncan-Durst, founder of LivePath, a customer experience consultancy. "Plus, it saves money by reducing the chances that gifts will be returned."

Actually, I believe what I said is that, even if an item purchased through a list or registry is returned, the registries help ensure that consumer dollars stay with a given retailer through exchanges or credits - rather than cash-back refunds. :-)

I believe I also said a lot about the future of gift registries and wish lists, referencing social media. :-) Nevertheless, the ettiquite part of this article offers some great considerations.

Cheers, and happy shopping!

Today on Marketing Profs

2008-11-19T11:26:00.002-05:00

I spent some time thinking about frequent travel and loyalty programs. Flushed out some thoughts today at the Marketing Prof's Daily Fix. Please check it out, and let me know what you think!

Best Buy: Empowering the Organization Through Social Media

2008-11-17T11:54:00.004-05:00

I've been writing for a few years about Best Buy and their successful attempts to become more customer centric. Here are two very insightful videos courtesy of Peter Hirshberg's Vimeo Channel. The first is Peter's interview with CEO Brand Anderson at Google's Zeitgiest on Best Buy's use of social media to empower the organization. The second is a video showcasing The Company as Wiki from Best Buy. All in all - Best Buy is an outstanding case study! Enjoy!

From peter hirshberg.

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From peter hirshberg.

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I have it on very solid authority that Best Buy will soon be launching a customer listening / co-creation site that provides them with greater access to voice of the customer. Stay tuned for more great stuff!

Data Mining and Customer Experience

2008-11-11T14:45:00.004-05:00

Last week, I spoke at the Clarabridge User Conference at the spectacular Gaylord National in National Harbor, MD. It was a great experience.

Clarabridge is a company that provides incredibly robust text mining tools that also plug into Business Intelligence tools like MicroStrategy, Cognos and others. In short, Clarabridge's data mining solutions allow companies to mine structured and unstructured customer feedback to create highly robust views from any data repository. These flexible views of customer data help companies identify themes and trends -- enabling drill down into actual customer comments for increased context and insight. The technology is being actively used by companies like Intuit, Marriott, GAP and United Airlines, Gaylord Entertainment and other leading corporations.

One of the things I noted from attendees actively using the tools was the claim that Clarabridge has driven significant business value, ROI and cost savings, even in early stages of deployment. That’s something that’s really nice to hear, and part of the reason I wanted to speak at this conference.

I was impressed by the number of sharp people at this event. Most were mid-to-senior executive level leaders, working in Customer Contact Center, Marketing, Product Development or Operations. The insights they shared went far beyond how to use a tool like Clarabridge, extending into best practices for gathering and measuring customer insight, how to harness insights, rally the organization for customer-focused change, and the future applications of data mining technologies.

I presented on the topic of “The Experience Enterprise” with other speakers including Colin Shaw, of Beyond Philosphy and Bob Thompson, founder of Customer Think. Clarabridge also assembled some terrific customer panels to harness insight “from the trenches,” which enabled attendees to harness lessons-learned and best practices from those working on the front-lines with the tools. In general, it was a great time to hear from the user community, check out new features and functionality, and discuss the future application of this type of technology in the field.

Consistent themes that surfaced (in no specific order) include the following:

Impacts of Down Economy. Participants agreed that while the coming economy is driving change in their organizations, customer intelligence solutions such as BI and Data Mining may not deeply feel the effects because of the direct value they provide to the business. This is good news for this technology sector and for companies working to become more customer-centric.

Getting Started with Data Mining. Intuit’s recommended approach is to develop a proof of concept hosted at the vendor. Rather than purchasing, hosting and configuring the solution alone, starting with an “out of the box” configuration that can be applied across the organization. Identify and attempting to resolve a key issue by obtaining more meaningful customer insight. Once the insight is obtained, “tell the story” using real data, real quotes and trending. Use the tool to demonstrate how insights were obtained. Once the tool is embraced, roll it out within a targeted area with an eye toward a larger, disciplined deployment.

Customer Surveys. Consensus is that companies are relying too heavily on post-service surveys. This creates a number of problems. First, the every day consumer /customer is being “surveyed to death,” resulting in frustration, filtering and lower response rates. Second, post-service surveys are reactive, in nature. While post-service surveys are a necessary evil, attendees agreed on the importance of gathering “in-stream” feedback from customers. Using this feedback, it’s possible to adjust course more proactively to better manage customers and foster retention of high risk customers.

Net Promoter Score. Many attendees acknowledged the usefulness of the Net Promoter Score and also acknowledged that it may be too simple or narrow to drive meaningful insight into the customer experience. While it is highly effective in illustrating the outcome of a customer’s experience, it fails to illustrate what’s not working, what’s breaking down, and what could be improved to drive better success.

Data Mining and Frontline Employees. Frontline employees are an incredibly important resource for providing customer-focused insight to companies. Using new tools and technologies like Data Mining are, potentially as useful when applied internally as they are applied to the external customer audience. Using the tools in this manner can also be quite economical. Listening to frontline employees and empowering the frontline with the tools and authority to solve customer problems is critical for future success. Balancing this need will be a challenge with the current economy.

Data Mining and Social Media Channels. The application of data mining technologies within social media channels is the “next big thing.” As companies lose control of customer dialog, harnessing insights, trends and information from unstructured channels like Facebook and Twitter will be increasingly necessary and not without analytical challenges.

Data Mining and Emotional Experiences. Leveraging data mining to extract robust information about how customers think, behave and respond emotionally to aspects of their customer experience(s), may be one of the next-generation applications of these tools. Developing the ability to recognize “warning signs” (based on emotional response) in customers and proactively drive risk mitigation tactics will become an essential component of designing good experience. Understanding the thoughts and emotions that motivate customer behaviors and drive employee decisions will play an essential role in designing and delivering future branded experiences.

Data Mining and Customer Experience. Research shows that executives agree that Customer Experience will be the next competitive battleground in a rough economy. Providing good experience is highly operational in nature and requires a formalized approach that is driven from the top-down. Adopting a formal approach, including mapping key tasks and experiences, identifying gaps and developing a plan for improvement is critical. Utilizing new technologies to harness in-stream customer insight is an essential part of developing more meaningful, satisfying experiences.

Difficult to summarize three days of discussion in one small post, but this is a feeble attempt. In summary, kudos to the team at Clarabridge for hosting their first user conference and an outstanding event. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the technology, I recommend a visit to the site and check out the Flash demo and use cases.

Social Media Categories

2008-09-15T13:32:00.005-04:00

I've been playing around with a list I've compiled of over 3,000 social media applications, tools and utilities ... This has prompted me to ask whether or not there is a standardized industry list of social media categories - or a well thought out manner of categorizing the proliferating social media landscape. Thought I'd put it out for discussion.

Few up-front notes on my goals/questions related to this exercise:

Keep it broad enough to be meaningful.
Focus on the "main focus" of the site/tool/app with recognition that there may be some overlap between categories
Consider "features" such as profiling, rankings, purchasing, etc... as attributes of brands within each category - rather than categories themselves.
Also keep topics, such as "events" or "teens" as a separate attribute of a brand within a specific category.
Software/hosting providers aren't the major focus here - perhaps put these in as another category?
Services only for corporate use (e.g. Yammer) might warrant a new category

So - here are the categories I have so far. Please weigh in!

Aggregators – Any site that takes (refeeds) content from a bunch of sites and lumps it together in one site. Content may include news, profiles, blog posts, etc. These sites allow/encourage community rankings of site content, and repost content based on popularity.

Wikis – Sites that offer user-driven or collaboratively created information. These can be encyclopaedic, like Wikipedia.

Mobile – Any site or tool that is focused on mobile use or marrying web with mobile

General Networks – Large, general communities that offer a wide array of services, including profiles, messaging, “friending”, social utilities, media sharing…

Niche Networks - Communities of any size that offer a wide array of services, including profiles, messaging, “friending”, social utilities, media, which are focused on a narrow topic or area of interest. For example: pet lovers, artists, politicos.

Media Sharing - Sites or utilities that primarily focus on sharing media of various types, including:

Books
Audio (includes music, radio, podcast)
Video
Television
Film
Animation
Multimedia
Slideshows
Presentations
Live Casting

Blogging - Sites or utilities focused on full-scale blogging. These can include companies that host blogging platforms, utilities for bloggers, blog aggregators, etc.

Microblogging – Sites or utilities focused on micro-blogging, or the 140 character or less quick status updates offered by Twitter, Friend Feed and many others

Bookmarking / Link Sharing – Ablity to memorize URL and share it…de.licio.us and other sites apply)

Utilities – Downloadable (e.g. Desktop application) or embeddable (e.g. You Tube Video or MyBloglog reader list) tools that can be used for a number of purposes. These include but are not limited to:

Search (finding anything!)
Desktop (e.g. downloadable desktop tool like Twirhl – twitter app
Productivity (to-do lists, etc.)
Contact Management (manage your contacts across outlook/email accounts)
Profile Management (e.g. manage your profile across Social Media sites)
Calendar/Events Management (create your own, create an integrated calendar with friends)
Messaging (messaging others via mobile, SMS, other)
Status/Lifestreaming (Manage/view status across social media sites e.g. hellotxt, ping.fm)
Listening/Measurement (Enable users to measure social media usage)
Blogging (some are just for bloggers)

Real World Connections – Sites that connect users online to real-world events in their local communities.

Experience Reporting – Any site with emphasis on having users report their experiences (life experiences, customer experiences) related to any event. This may include a life event, shopping event or transaction, attendance at a conference, etc.

Location-Based Services Sites that allow users to interact with other users or view data based on geography. E.g. Yelp (local reviews of local business)

Virtual Worlds – Sites that literally allow users to create avatars and interact within a 3D virtual environment such as Second Life

I'd appreciate your input on these categories! Is there anything you'd add or adjust? For example, where do you think Squidoo and Google Knol might fit?

The Accidental Evangelist

2008-09-08T10:55:00.003-04:00

Happy Monday!

As follow up to last week's Whole Foods swearing entry, I posted a follow up on the Marketing Profs website. The topic addresses another angle of what transpired, called "Accidental Evangelism". Please feel free to check it out, as well as the many other insightful articles posted there.

On a lighter note, my friend, Ann, has a new post on her Annarchy blog - featuring yours truly! Ann is a gifted writer. I find each one of her posts a delightful literary morsel.

Enjoy!