Sneak preview of my AOC'08 chapter

My Age of Conversation'08 chapter is titled 'Interactivity in the digital age' and talks about the characteristics of interactivity and how important certain interactive features are in building brand equity and consumer engagement through online tools.
Wait for August'08 to read the complete chapter!!!

Corporate Blogging Series II: Blogging and the Brand

Perusing through several corporate blogs to understand the objectives behind their existence, customer aquisition and retention appear important thoughts behind the strategic management decision to host the same.

To promote Customer Acquisition by building brand equity by
a)Showcasing organisational growth
b)Clarifying organisational vision, opinion and direction for consumers,
c)Image Building and
d)Brand Building

Acquisition is a vital stage and a focused and contextual interaction with the customers is beneficial to any organization for furthering it's brand. A corporate blog helps create a forum for open and integrated channels of communication between brand and consumer by enabling interactivity between brand and consumer.

Blogging is fast becoming an extremely important strategy for any online marketer.Research shows that organisations after having commenced blogging have climbed up the Alexa traffic rankings. As news articles about a relevant industry, product updates, interviews, insights into topics of importance to the target audience emerge on the blog, they create a subscriber base, the way people subscribe to the daily newspaper. This way regular updates on products, features etc. can reach the niche consumer base at a fast speed. Good quality relevant content, constant updation and creation of a blog environment where ideas flourish and debates on related topics keep people from the target market coming back is what works for these organisations

People who read organizational blogs perceive an organization's relational maintenance strategies as demonstrating more of a conversational human voice than those who read only the organization's traditional Web content or those in a control group who read Web content unrelated to the organization(Kellehar,Miller,2006)

The CISCO Blog is an open discussion forum where Cisco leaders address key technology issues and where community interaction is encouraged. By hosting a blog with the above viewpoint CISCO first built an image of the company as an authority in technology and developed a community to share its ideas.After developing a dignified readership base, by posting entries like “Patent Board: CISCO is #1 Leader in Telecom”, Cisco has managed to create an image of a highly competitive company which is centre-of-the business-universe telecommunications. Also, by featuring excellent reviews from the Fortune, Wired and Financial Times, CISCO has done well to use its blog effectively towards brand promotion!

The corporate blog of Tata Interactive Systems(TIS), gives a peek into the work being done and products being launched by TIS for learning disabilities of children with special educational needs, by showcasing the Tata Learning Disability Forum, Also, by hosting a category 'Life at TIS', TIS shares its organisational culture with the world.

Corporate Social Responsibility Blogs , like those of Mc Donald's and Hewlett Packard are fast catching on. With Mc Donald's discussing issues closer to health, nutrition and food safety , this endeavour contributes to an image building exercise, as a company valuing quality of food provided to the consumers. This is a good effort for a company which has faced a lot of criticism towards promoting unhealthy food habits.

From the perspective of Jonathan Schwartz, the CEO of Sun Microsystems, blogging is not an appendage to Sun’s marketing communications strategy today-it is central to it. Blogs have authenticated the Sun brand more than any typical advertising campaign and associated with Sun a respectable degree of tenacity and authenticity.

The Corporate Blogging Series-I : Corporate Blogs can make organisations customer centric.

I start a Corporate blogging series today and this is the first of the posts in the sequence. The series shall aim at sharing small anecdotes and snippets as part of my research in the area. While empirical studies are reserved for being published in different journals, some interesting organisational issues will be brought into focus.

For starters I republish an article published at Customerthink in August 2007 on General Motors and it's corporate blog!!.

Corporate Blogs can make organisations customer centric.

As senior executives from General Motors tried to figure out ways to understand market sentiment, a suggestion from a reader on the GM Fastlane blog caught the eye of executives. It said:

Offer a "green" alternative for every model you market and do it now. Hybrids tend to be expensive and clunky, but the technology is rapidly evolving and GM is behind.

Almost a year later, GM announced the Chevy Volt, a plug-in hybrid car touted, not so much as a mode of transportation, but as part of a solution to the nation's energy crisis.

If you want to make your business customer-centric, you need a good CRM strategy that aims at providing a good platform for both your organization and your customer. This customer-centric modus operandi should pay adequate attention to the customer's process of product adoption. And it should focus on issues ranging from options available to customers and suitable promotional campaigns to showcase your product and managing the buzz about your product to concentrating on what your existing customers have to say.

The idea is to keep your current and prospective customers not only up to date with the developments in your organization but also involved by giving them a platform to share their views. The same platform can again be used to provide clarifications to any information circulating in the environment.

Auto giant GM used its blog to manage and nurture its relationships with customers. The blog, as you probably know, evolved from "weblog," a personal diary posted on a web page. Now it has come to mean opinionated posts, and smart corporations like GM are learning that they can serve as a powerful tool for gauging customer opinion.

As GM vehicles improved and quality and reliability issues were addressed, GM executives understood that the auto maker still was losing market share, as consumers found more value and more of what they wanted in other brands.

A peek
So executives decided to use the blog to gain a peek into what customers thought. They formulated a customer retention strategy involving exploring and evaluating customer expectations and establishing strategies through examining feedback. In a post in February 2006, Bob Lutz, GM's vice chairman, outlined the company's current fixation. with consumer consideration levels. On a post querying the general public on how GM could increase awareness, improve its public image and serve the customers better, Lutz outlined details of how GM's vehicles had won the MotorWeek Driver's Choice Awards, the Intellichoice Best Overall Value Awards and the Autobytel Consumer Choice Award.

He, hence, was using his post not only as a data-gathering mechanism but also as a brand-building opportunity. The post garnered 339 comments, ranging from suggestions on product overhauling to pricing strategies to advertisement campaigns to new marketing strategies and product comparisons with competitors. While some respondents, whose ages ranged from 22 to 55 (based on their profiles and what they shared in their contributions), went on to suggest strategies"such as making entry level cars the best; training dealers to making interiors nicer; and sharpening its focus and its brand recognition"others went far beyond that by suggesting joint ventures with Ford or even hiring Bill Clinton as a spokesman. One suggestion on offering "green" alternatives, however, appears to have struck a chord. Organizational decisions are not taken on basis of singular ideas, but customer opinions always matter"as you could see with the launch of a similar vehicle a year later.

At a Detroit auto show, GM executives unveiled plans to build the Chevy Volt, and the vehicle's touted environmental breakthrough generated buzz"and gave birth to some controversy. The Detroit News' Autos Insider carried a piece that refuted GM's claims and abilities to deliver the promise.

But here, again, the blog served the company's purpose. GM lashed back with a response on the blog from Lutz titled, GM Charging Ahead With Volt. In it, he reiterated GM's commitment to deliver what was promised and tackle any technological obstacles in the way, while also committing to be as transparent as possible in this process. The post attracted 121 comments, with at least 50 percent of the comments applauding GM's endeavors and its commitment to its mission. The naysayers ended up losing a lot of steam!.

A careful look at the collaborative web shows that corporate blogging is fast emerging as a viable option for corporations to evoke value perception in the mind of a customer. Enhancing a company's current data repository tools with a wiki (a web site that allows users to add and change content) or a blogging platform can greatly improve the quality, timeliness and collective power of the data, thereby affecting a customer's perception of value, improving customer satisfaction and retention.

Marketers can use blogs for brand management, to build credibility and to gain customer trust, as well as for relationship management. The GM Fastlane Blog allows the car maker to engage in a focused and contextual interaction with its customers, demonstrating that the company values customers' roles as "initiators," "influencers," "deciders," "buyers" and "users."

In my experience in the field of business development, I recognize that customers want to be listened to. They do not want to be passive receptors of a company's sales pitch.

By implementing a well-thought-out blogging strategy and encouraging a good level of community goodwill that, in turn, can be measured in terms of happier customers, you can leverage the power of your corporate blog to gain a real-time competitive advantage for managing relationships with your customers.

Granted, it lacks the sophistication of customizable monitoring and reporting tools marketers generally use to measure the effectiveness of a promotional campaign, but it's a simple way to keep track of customer sentiment. If you know what your customers feel and can connect to them emotionally, you've managed to make your organization customer-centric to quite an extent.

The Age of Conversation 2.0

‘The Age of Conversation 2.0: Why Don’t People Get It?’ is a collective endeavour of 275 authors, who are going to write on a myriad range of subjects relevant to the social media space, breaking geographical barriers and creating history with respect to the voluminous degree of particpation in an era of virtual collaboration.

A participatory,conversational, creative selection of perspectives from individuals rooted across diverse global locations, should make interesting reading.

A brainchild of Drew McLellan and Gavin Heaton, The Age of Conversation which was a collective venture of over a 100 of the world’s leading marketers, writers, thinkers and creative innovators, turned out to be a successful experiment and received a tremendous response, thereby raising money for Variety, the children's charity.

The authors of the the second book-'Age of Conversation 2.0' are-

Adam Crowe, Adrian Ho, Aki Spicer, Alex Henault, Amy Jussel, Andrew Odom, Andy Nulman, Andy Sernovitz, Andy Whitlock, Angela Maiers, Ann Handley, Anna Farmery, Armando Alves, Arun Rajagopal, Asi Sharabi, Becky Carroll, Becky McCray, Bernie Scheffler, Bill Gammell, Bob Carlton, Bob LeDrew, Brad Shorr, Bradley Spitzer, Brandon Murphy, Branislav Peric, Brent Dixon, Brett Macfarlane, Brian Reich, C.C. Chapman, Cam Beck, Casper Willer, Cathleen Rittereiser, Cathryn Hrudicka, Cedric Giorgi, Charles Sipe, Chris Kieff, Chris Cree, Chris Wilson, Christina Kerley (CK), C.B. Whittemore, Clay Parker Jones, Chris Brown, Colin McKay, Connie Bensen, Connie Reece, Cord Silverstein, Corentin Monot, Craig Wilson, Daniel Honigman, Dan Goldstein, Dan Schawbel, Dana VanDen Heuvel, Dan Sitter, Daria Radota Rasmussen, Darren Herman, Darryl Patterson, Dave Davison, Dave Origano, David Armano, David Bausola, David Berkowitz, David Brazeal, David Koopmans, David Meerman Scott, David Petherick, David Reich, David Weinfeld, David Zinger, Deanna Gernert, Deborah Brown, Dennis Price, Derrick Kwa, Dino Demopoulos, Doug Haslam, Doug Meacham, Doug Mitchell, Douglas Hanna, Douglas Karr, Drew McLellan, Duane Brown, Dustin Jacobsen, Dylan Viner, Ed Brenegar, Ed Cotton, Efrain Mendicuti, Ellen Weber, Emily Reed, Eric Peterson, Eric Nehrlich, Ernie Mosteller, Faris Yakob, Fernanda Romano, Francis Anderson, G. Kofi Annan, Gareth Kay, Gary Cohen, Gaurav Mishra, Gavin Heaton, Geert Desager, George Jenkins, G.L. Hoffman, Gianandrea Facchini, Gordon Whitehead, Graham Hill, Greg Verdino, Gretel Going & Kathryn Fleming, Hillel Cooperman, Hugh Weber, J. Erik Potter, J.C. Hutchins, James Gordon-Macintosh, Jamey Shiels, Jasmin Tragas, Jason Oke, Jay Ehret, Jeanne Dininni, Jeff De Cagna, Jeff Gwynne, Jeff Noble, Jeff Wallace, Jennifer Warwick, Jenny Meade, Jeremy Fuksa, Jeremy Heilpern, Jeremy Middleton, Jeroen Verkroost, Jessica Hagy, Joanna Young, Joe Pulizzi, Joe Talbott, John Herrington, John Jantsch, John Moore, John Rosen, John Todor, Jon Burg, Jon Swanson, Jonathan Trenn, Jordan Behan, Julie Fleischer, Justin Flowers, Justin Foster, Karl Turley, Kate Trgovac, Katie Chatfield, Katie Konrath, Kenny Lauer, Keri Willenborg, Kevin Jessop, Kris Hoet, Krishna De, Kristin Gorski, Laura Fitton, Laurence Helene Borei, Lewis Green, Lois Kelly, Lori Magno, Louise Barnes-Johnston, Louise Mangan, Louise Manning, Luc Debaisieux, Marcus Brown, Mario Vellandi, Mark Blair, Mark Earls, Mark Goren, Mark Hancock, Mark Lewis, Mark McGuinness, Mark McSpadden, Matt Dickman, Matt J. McDonald, Matt Moore, Michael Hawkins, Michael Karnjanaprakorn, Michelle Lamar, Mike Arauz, Mike McAllen, Mike Sansone, Mitch Joel, Monica Wright, Nathan Gilliatt, Nathan Snell, Neil Perkin, Nettie Hartsock, Nick Rice, Oleksandr Skorokhod, Ozgur Alaz, Paul Chaney, Paul Hebert, Paul Isakson, Paul Marobella, Paul McEnany, Paul Tedesco, Paul Williams, Pet Campbell, Pete Deutschman, Peter Corbett, Phil Gerbyshak, Phil Lewis, Phil Soden, Piet Wulleman, Rachel Steiner, Sreeraj Menon, Reginald Adkins, Richard Huntington, Rishi Desai, Beeker Northam, Rob Mortimer, Robert Hruzek, Roberta Rosenberg, Robyn McMaster, Roger von Oech, Rohit Bhargava, Ron Shevlin, Ryan Barrett, Ryan Karpeles, Ryan Rasmussen, Sam Huleatt, Sandy Renshaw, Scott Goodson, Scott Monty, Scott Townsend, Scott White, Sean Howard, Sean Scott, Seni Thomas, Seth Gaffney, Shama Hyder, Sheila Scarborough, Sheryl Steadman, Simon Payn, Sonia Simone, Spike Jones, Stanley Johnson, Stephen Collins, Stephen Cribbett, Stephen Landau, Stephen Smith, Steve Bannister, Steve Hardy, Steve Portigal, Steve Roesler, Steven Verbruggen, Steve Woodruff, Sue Edworthy, Susan Bird, Susan Gunelius, Susan Heywood, Tammy Lenski, Terrell Meek, Thomas Clifford, Thomas Knoll, Tiffany Kenyon, Tim Brunelle, Tim Buesing, Tim Connor, Tim Jackson, Tim Longhurst, Tim Mannveille, Tim Tyler, Timothy Johnson, Tinu Abayomi-Paul, Toby Bloomberg, Todd Andrlik, Troy Rutter, Troy Worman, Uwe Hook, Valeria Maltoni, Vandana Ahuja, Vanessa DiMauro, Veronique Rabuteau, Wayne Buckhanan, William Azaroff, Yves Van Landeghem

Personality not included-The interview

As Rohit Bhargava, at the Influential Marketing Blog, prepared to launch his book "Personality not included", he sent across a couple of sneak peeks about his book to his online groups.As part of his facebook group, a look at the contents piqued my interest enough to send across a series of questions to him when he offered to respond to a 5 queries each, sent across to him by a set of bloggers, as part of his book promotion.This is part of the innovative Personality not included Interview Series. (Rohit is Senior Vice President, Digital Strategy & Marketing, Ogilvy Public Relations and is atop marketing blogger)

Read on.....You can read the rest of the series here

1.Can Social media help a great brand turn around the lost face value of a company?
I think it can, as long as it is used to give people a deeper look at a company and what it stands for. Dell is a good example of a brand that has managed to do exactly that.

2.You talk about new styles of marketing in your book.How relevant would social media be to 'Participation marketing' and 'Curiosity marketing'?
Social media is perfectly relevant when it comes to the idea of participation marketing. In fact, this is probably heavily about social media in the first place. As for curiosity marketing, that is really described as more of a viral marketing strategy, but could definitely relate to social media as well.

3.Can a corporate blog add to a company's personality?
Of course, in fact this can be a great way of bringing a company's personality to more visiblity.

4.How useful is personality in maintaining customer relationships?Personality is a key element in personal relationships with customers, particularly when it comes to longer relationship types of sales such as those that frequently happen in BtoB sales.

5.How big a role do you think social media can play in enlightening and empowering a consumer?
I believe it plays a very big role and it is a key element of the book to share some insights on how this may happen. For example, one brand that did this particularly well was the new aloft hotel chain from Starwood which allowed customers to collaborate and share feedback on the design of the hotel early in the process and is now in the midst of launching many properties worldwide.

Social media is here to stay

Responses from senior executives across companies in various countries profile an increasing understanding of the use of social media to harness market intelligence and understand consumer perception.(Source:Research done by media company Cymfony)

From Dell to Starbucks:From Ideastorm to My Starbucks Idea

A lot of discussion on organisations using social media as a tool to manage customer relationships has moved around companies using the same for brand visibilty and giving the customers a platform to interact and share, but failing to actually engage customers-as in closing the loop by actually showing the consumer what the company did with those ideas.

Looks like Starbucks was listening-
My Starbucks idea is the response.

As Jeff Jarvis had once rightly said that customers would have conversations about a company, products and services. It hence made more sense for the company to become part of these conversations. A series of branded online communities and corporate blogs followed suite.Starbucks apparently has gone a step forward.By providing a space for consumers to share their thoughts, let others vote on those thoughts and create a point system to rate ideas, it has actually made a concious effort to work on the consumer relationship.

Social media non-believers have screamed in the past about the inability of the medium to clearly showcase what the companies were doing with the consumer feedback or how the same was being leveraged.

This is a case in point!!!!!

CustomerThink Announces Global Awards Program To Recognize Customer-Centric Business Leaders

As per the Press Release dt. 20th March, 2008, California-

In today's connected world, it's more important than ever before for organizations of all sizes to build truly customer-centric business strategies. CustomerThink today is announcing a global awards program to recognize business leaders for initiatives that have delivered win-win results for customers and the organization.

With the opening of the awards nominations, CustomerThink is seeking case histories of companies that have succeeded in a wide range of initiatives, from broad strategic and customer loyalty projects to more tactical efforts aimed at improving customer-centric performance in marketing, sales, customer service, web-based marketing, voice of the consumer and the social web.

CustomerThink Global Awards 2008 is not just another recognition program for CRM technology projects, said CustomerThink founder Bob Thompson. Unfortunately, research has found that "CRM" has come to primarily mean managing customer information or automating processes. Successful customer-centric businesses, however, are the result of the right combination of strategy, metrics, people, processes and technology," Thompson said.

The judges for the awards have a mandate to base their selections for award winners on delivering better value for their customers and, in doing so, building more profitable growth for their organizations. Leadership, ROI and excellence in customer-centric practices will be key factors in selecting the winners.

Nominations may be submitted at
Customerthink Awards 2008

Award nominees (or their delegates) must submit a case study for review by a distinguished panel of industry thought leaders chaired by Thompson and drawn from CustomerThink's 2007-2008 Advisory Councils. The judges are (in alphabetical order):

Vandana Ahuja, Jaypee Institute of Information Technology University (India)
Elana Anderson, NxtERA Marketing (United States)
Olga Botero, Grupo Bancolombia (Colombia)
Silvana Buljan, Smartworxx (Spain)
Francis Buttle, Francis Buttle & Associates P/L (Austrailia)
Daryl Choy, WisdomBoom (Hong Kong)
Jay Curry, Jay Curry Associates (The Netherlands)
Naras Eechambadi, Quaero Corp. (United States)
Mei Lin Fung, Institute of Service Organization Excellence (United States)
Bob Furniss, Touchpoint Associates (United States)
Jack Fujieda, ReGIS Inc. (Japan)
Graham Hill, CACI Sophron (Germany)
John Holland, CustomerCentric Selling (United States)
Bob Kaden, The Kaden Company (United States)
Doug Leather, REAP Consulting (Pty) Ltd (South Africa)
Dick Lee, High-Yield Methods (United States)
Michael Lowenstein, Harris Interactive (United States)
Bill Price, Driva Solutions, LLC (United States)
David Rance, Round (United Kingdom)
Andy Rudin, Outside Technologies, Inc. (United States)
Alan See, Seapine Software (United States)
John Todor, Ph.D., The Whetstone Edge, LLC (United States)
Nominations will be open through May 31, 2008. Category finalists will be selected in June, with winners announced in July. Category finalists will be recognized at regional awards meetings in the September-October time frame. Other recognition will include a memento, mention in a press release and a featured case study on CustomerThink.

About CustomerThink-

CustomerThink, the global thought leader in customer-centric business strategy, was founded in 2000 (as CRMGuru.com) by Bob Thompson, CEO of CustomerThink Corp. The site was renamed to CustomerThink in April 2007. CustomerThink's mission is to help business leaders develop and implement customer-centric business strategies. CustomerThink does this by publishing high-quality articles, blogs and discussion; conducting research on key issues and trends; and facilitating interactions with a global panel of experts.

Brands and Social Media

Gaurav Mishra of Gauravonomics has compiled a list of Marketing, Social Media and Public Relations Blogs in India. Thanx Gaurav, for including my blog in the list!!!

Gaurav's post on why brands should embrace social media is apt-As he says,
Very soon, social media will be the only cost effective way to reach consumers, courtesy the decreasing cost of consumer engagement through this medium.

My take on this-
Social media helps build brand equity like never before..building the most valuable assets of the firm by adding to consumer knowledge by granting the average consumer ease of access and the ability to engage via an interactive medium.
This creates meaningful brand encounters, thereby deepening consumer brand relationshps and influencing consumer perceptions.

A case in point has been Unilever.As Unilever makes it to the no.1 position as the digital marketer of the year 2008, it is interesting to note that the campaign under discussion is for the brand called Suave. Unilever takes advantage of social media by using a neat online community called in the motherhood.The webisodes based on the personal lives of the community members obviously touch a chord with the consumer base.

All the best Gaurav...for achieving your dream of becoming the next marketing guru.(Gaurav is an Assistant General Manager (Brand Head Indica) at Tata Motors.)

Marketers and Wikipedia

As Pete Blackshaw gears up to write about 10 uses of wikipedia for marketers, Some of my thoughts about wikipedia-
1.Positioned as an encyclopedia, it is ostensibly a collaborative directory.So listing a product or brand in this directory makes sense...
2.Since a prerequisite to uploading data on wikipedia is citing references independent of source, the uploaded material automatically gets linked to several other sites and material about the product/brand on the web. It's hence a one stop shop for substantial amount of credible data on your product for a wannabe consumer, and the very fact that it is moderated grants authentication to the same.....
3.Making a brand figure prominently in google searches is obviously a foregone conclusion to why marketers should use wikipedia.....

As he wrote to us on the CGM group, i found his references to Wikipedia as a "trust broker" very interesting. The way the grand masters at wikipedia handle discussions, the level of "transparency", as referred to by Pete is commendable. Further, as the grand masters insist that Wikipedia is not a promotional service, articles on a brand or product eventually are written in an academic fashion.In the process the credibility gained by the brand is unmistakable!!!!

Social Media strategy

Graham's comments on my article on 'Building Loyalty the Southwest way ' on Customerthink pointed to the need for companies to have a well defined social media strategy as they venture out into the field to interact with their clients. Graham had a valid point as he was able to demonstrate the lack of engagement on Southwest's part as they used varied social media tools to engage with their customers.
The POST method demonstrated at the Forrester forum is interesting and approporiate to this discussion.
Using social media as an organisational strategy for listening to the customer is not enough. Two important aspects emerge here-
1.Engaging in a conversation with the customer.
2.Using the customer feedback to alter systems/strategies.
3.Using the social media tool to showcase this change in systems through incorporation of feedback.

Bob Thompson had an interesting point to add to the conversation-that of the need to try to use newer offerings of technology in an increasingly competitive market. After all, it is simply a way of staying a step ahead of your competitors.

Peoplecentricity or Customercentricity?

India recently witnessed the launch of the Tata Nano-the “people’s” car-The much awaited $2500 car for the common man. Tata Motors Limited is India's largest automobile company, with revenues of over $USD 7.2 billion.

A car which made it to the TIME most important cars of the century, however, rides on its “people-centricity”-touted as the people’s car…and the understanding that the common man in India wants to move from a two wheeler to a four wheeler…only affording it was a problem…the volume symbolized by the term ‘common man’ in a country like India is obviously a function of the population of the nation!!!! The near stampede , to get a glimpse of the car, that erupted in the Auto-expo where it was showcased is ample reflection of the enthusiasm of the “people”. All these “people” are obviously not in the potential customers category.

The world’s cheapest car, which may yield a transportation revolution, prides itself in being a people-centric endeavour. Some interesting observations-

1. A google search, uses the link www.tatapeoplescar.com to lead to an intrinsically social media driven website for the Tata Nano. Ranging from a Dream Car Configurator (create your dream car and spice it up with features list), options to share your first impression, Contests, Blogs, Forums-it’s all there.

2.Over 12,000 members are already part of the forum(the yet to be made available to the public car made its debut just a fortnight back)….is the volume an indicator of the “people” interested in the product rather than the “customers”? The volume does appear significant in such a duration.

3.The “ Online booking thread” highlighting an increasing demand for the car to be available online garnered 1000+ hits, resulted in a blog post from Subodh Marathe, Head of Marketing Services, Tata Motors…He says-”The option of online car sales is certainly worth exploring and your comments will help us design the right service.” Looks like they are doing the job of listening to the “people”.

The interesting issue here is-The word “people” seems to have more mass appeal than the word “customer”. All the people here cannot be considered to be akin to the word “customer” or can they? How different is the word “Customer” from the word “ People” ? Is Peoplethink a more important dimension than Customerthink ?

Tagcrowd of my blog

ahuja (8) blogging (43) brand (16) building (14) capital (6) co-creation (6) cocreation (4) collaborative (10) comcast (8) comments (9) communities (19) company (7) consumer (23) corporate (21) council (5) customer (13) develop (4) employee (6) equity (4) experience (4) generated (9) interact (6) interesting (5) knowledge (9) labels (7) leverage (4) links (7) management (6) marketing (11) media (25) networking (8) online (21) organisations (4) participation (8) pm (5) post (18) product (7) relationship (5) resources (5) share (4) site (4) social (24) sunsilk (4) television (6) think (5) tools (9) value (7) vandana (8) videos (4) web (24)

created at TagCrowd.com

TagCrowd is a web application for visualizing word frequencies in any user-supplied text by creating what is popularly known as a tag cloud or text cloud.Saw the same at Pete Blackshaw's blog and thought I should give it a try.

Building Knowledge capital through social media

A lot of discussion has already gone into social media's contribution to building brand/customer equity and as a tool to build networks of relationships/friendships- social capital as it is termed.
However, in this era of knowledge management and elearning, two more dimensions of social media’s contribution cannot be ignored-
1.A tool for building a company’s knowledge capital and
2.A tool for learning.

Organisations have started harnessing collaborative intelligence for learning leading to cognitive involvement of the community members. Research has already proven the positive correlation between interactivity and learning outcomes. Interactivity interfaced with technology not only increases learning effectiveness, but also enhances the knowledge base of the community which includes organizational employees, customers and partners.

Be it the Microsoft Developer Network which hosts a series of employee blogs to share tips on software, programming tips and solutions to programming issues or the GE research blogs, or the Sun Microsystem employee Blogs, the volume of company specific knowledge available on these is huge. Sun Microsystem CEO Jonathan Schwartz uses his blog for product announcements and discussion of new knowledge issues as part of his bid to interact with the community. Think of a layman’s ability to gain access to Sun’s whitepaper on multiplatform virtualisation through his online blog!!!!

The accumulation of this company specific information have also made these blogs/online communities virtual repositories to be tapped whenever required. For that matter, think of the quantum of knowledge that can be retrieved regarding a person’s work in an organisation once he leaves, through his contributions to his blogs etc. The human capital may be dynamic, but the knowledge capital stays with the organisation…

Cocreation through social media

In an era where companies talk about the new form of value creation-Co-creation, where companies are moving away from a company and product centred value creation to an experience centred value creation (Prahlad,Ramaswamy), participation is becoming a desired ingredient. Objectives of co-creation include identifying the right customer set to interact and after identifying the requirements of this customer set, alter product offerings as per requirement of the same.

Some interesting observations from research (Prahlad,Ramaswamy) on Co-creation.
1.In the emerging economic model of value cocreation, consumers and companies routinely collaborate to create personalized value.

2. Cocreation, is not the transfer or outsourcing of activities to customers or a marginal customization of products and services. It isn't scripting or staging of customer events around the company's offerings. Those kinds of company-customer interactions no longer satisfy most consumers today.
IT IS THE CO-CREATION EXPERIENCE(NOT THE OFFERING) THAT IS THE BASIS OF VALUE FOR EACH INDIVIDUAL.

It is hence, this procedure of participation which is important.
Co-creation may require a dedicated approach from the management to allow consumers to not exactly take over the brand, but definitely have a larger voice share. However the high involvement opportunity it offers with substantial value growth drives commitment from organizational leadership.

Kraft's use of co-creation
Consumers co-create 48 products they want to buyis a case in point.

Use of social media to build online communities for consumer engagement to leverage the collective intelligence and experience of the community emerges as a strong option for organisations interested in securing consumer participation...they may also need to focus on the experience they provide through these communities to the participating population.

There are consumers interested in getting involved in every stage of the Product life cycle from concept, through post launch and beyond. The bottomline is-there are passionate groups of involved customers willing to PARTICIPATE. It is upto the organizations to identify them, build relationships with them and leverage the immense power of the participating community for organizational growth.

The Blogging Council

And finally arrives the council for organisations using corporate blogging as a tool for interacting with customers/employees.
Developed as a forum specifically for corporates who blog, members already include-
AccuQuote,Cisco,The Coca-Cola Company,Dell,Gemstar-TV Guide,General Motors,Kaiser Permanente,Microsoft,Nokia,SAP,Starwood Hotels and Resorts,Wells Fargo.

The Blog Council is a community for official corporate blogs and bloggers that represent major global corporations.

Their mission is to address the unique needs of blogging in a corporate environment. It exists as a forum for executives to meet, share tactics and advice, and develop best practices. The Blog Council is here to help create:

Best Practices: Promoting corporate blogging excellence through best practices, standards, and training.
Community: Providing networking and partnering opportunities for leaders of the corporate blogging movement.
ROI: Developing metrics programs that help deliver measurable ROI from blog activities.

Let's hope this emerges as a structured location to understand corporate blogging objectives, outcomes and benefits...Looks like the first place these big corporates have come together to share their corporate blogging activities.

What's a Blog?

In this video at Pajama Market, Brian Brown offers an easy-to-comprehend tutorial on blogs that explains what they are and how they work.

So, what makes a blog a blog?

It's a Web site. This might seem too obvious, but for technophobes it might need to be said.
Adding articles is like writing an email. It's as simple as writing a title, writing a message, attaching an image and hitting send.
Readers can post comments. This interactive element differentiates blogs from many other Web sites.
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(Source:Marketing Profs)

Headhunting tools

An interesting tip by Ric McIver, following my post on Headhunting made easy using Web 2.0, a list of 50 freebie tools and resources that are frequented by prime job searchers.
50 Freebie Tools to Find Your Next All-Star Employee
Check it out!!!

Branded Online Communities move to Television

Branded Online communities, set up by companies for Building brand equity are now tying up with the electronic media for greater visibility. As the interest of the youth increases in social networking, with humongous volumes of youngsters not only hanging around networking sites, but also eagerly participating in consumer communities,these branded online communities have found themselves most wanted on Television.

In a recent developmentin India, Hindustan Unilever's SUNSILK GANG OF GIRLS, an online community , and Zoom Television have come together to present a singing reality show called Sunsilk Gang of Girls - Spotlight Mein.

In response to online applications at the Sunsilk GOG site, this new television series will present four talented girls in the country who will be groomed and mentored by maestros from the music and entertainment fraternity, in preparation for a live finalé performance in front of a big audience.Reality TV, it's success, the impact generated and the huge volume of viewership it draws is not new to us.

As branded online communities embrace Television, the euphoria created by such shows will further increase traffic on the site-increased membership is a foregone conclusion.

Kelly Mooney's thoughts in an ADAGE article on For Relevance, Think Three-Way throw light on how corporates can leverage such situations.By looking at the Brand, the consumer and online communities as three components of a love triangle, she reiterates the need for brands to intersect with online communities, to be able to connect with their consumers.

An excerpt-
"There are no diminishing returns when brands think three-way, when they "triangulate" to communicate in a b-to-we world. Online communities are an infinite resource bringing not only preexisting participants within the brand's range, but new i-citizens formerly uninvolved until their passions are sparked by a marketing campaign or message that inspires them to spread the love."

In Sunsilk's case,the three sides of the triangle are aptly covered- the brand connects to each girl and the fan community; the girls connect to the brand and each other -- all tied to the community or the event as the center.While acting as excellent repositories for information, such communities help the brand marketers by providing information to validate their understanding of the market, while further bifurcating consumers with respect to preferences, expectations, and level of brand loyalty.

The CRM Forum, Mumbai

was invited to conduct a session on 'Social Media and the Customer Relationship' at the CRM Forum organised by Marcus Evans at the Le Meridien, Mumbai, in October,2008. The event was aimed at achieving business excellence through an integration of information, people, policies, processes and technology strategies-effectively executing CRM on its own.

The CRM forum aimed at providing a platform to receive top notch knowledge in capitalising the concepts of CRM, latest trends in customer strategies and technologies, and developing organisation cultures to achieve customer satisfaction , along with advanced applications in the areas of creating a ynergistic partnership between marketing and IT to drive forward CRM initiatives, utilising brand strategies, the media, as wll as data warehousing and data mining.

The event unfolded with an interesting presentation by Dr. G. Shainesh, Associate Professor at the IIM Bangalore, India, where he talked about identifying the consequences of the shift from CRM with technology orientation to a business strategy. This was followed by an interesting case study presented by Mr Gautam Anand, Vice President, ITC Welcom Group on creating outstanding service levels and designing a service design.As several industry experts including Anupam Jalote, Chief Process Officer, Bharti Airtel, Dr. Wolfgang Messner, Director Capegemini shared their experiences, my session on Social Media, and its impact on customer relationships and consumer behaviour was well received.

As I focussed on Corporate Blogging as a potential tool for engagement and reducing the perceived indifference of organisations to consumers, Gaurav Lalla, Director of Internet Marketing,Taj Hotels, Resorts and Palaces emphasised the need of organisations to listen to customers and use the internet as a medium for the purpose.His reference to the utilisation of Second Life as an upcoming medium to conduct brand led dialogues with avatars was interesting.

The event was well attended by delegates from several sectors ranging from Banking and Insurance to hotels, healthcare, retail, telcom and airlines.