This post is short, sweet and extremely relevant in this age of consumer engagement. The following is a survey that asked the questions: which brands have the best communities around them and what makes a great community? Brand communities are a true sign of marketing success as they inspire consumers to engage with brands for reasons other than the obvious “carrot” incentive.
After writing a lot about community in both Spark and here on the blog, I've been wondering what's the latest state of brands and how the interact with communities by asking a couple of questions on Twitter.
1. "What brands have created the best communities around them?" Within a few hours I got about 50 answers. Here's the top 10:
1. Harley Davidson
2. Obama
3. Lego
4. Nike
5. Threadless
6. P&G
7. Dell
8. Starbucks
9. Whole Foods
10. Trader Joe's
2. "What makes a great community?" And, again the Top 10?
1. self-generating (do stuff)
2. belonging (feel part of group)
3. identity (stand for something)
4. experiences (bring people together)
5. a great cause
6. working to a shared goal
7. feedback & recognition
8. ease of participation
9. respect
10. love of and interest in a common goal
Source - John Winsor
12.6.09
Managing The Infinite
Managing your brand on social media can be a full time job. Communication in the online world is expected to operate at a much quicker rate and you could spend all day chatting away but it’s critical that you’re efficient with your time. Those who are efficient at managing online conversations have a few common practices to simply the process. Come discover a few tricks of the trade.
These days participating in social media such as Twitter, Facebook, blogging and more is almost required for any entrepreneur or business, small or large.
But there’s so much info and chatter coming in through social media that it can overwhelm you, eat up your time, and ruin your productivity.
Simplifying will help you stay in touch, and continue to participate in the conversation, without losing sight of your mission and the important work you need to get done.
Step 1. Use simple tools to make the most of social media
The simpler the tools, the better. But tools that combine two or more social media into one are best, because that means you need fewer tools. An example is TweetDeck (TweetDeck reviews) - not only does it incorporate Twitter (Twitter reviews), but you can see your Facebook (Facebook reviews) friends’ updates at the same time.
Another good example is Digsby, which combines email, IM, and social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn.
My setup uses Gmail (Gmail reviews), as it’s the communication tool that I use most often. I’ve set it up to be my all-in-one inbox: I can Twitter, Facebook, delicious, Flickr, IM and more. You can make Gmail your ultimate productivity center.
Step 2. Focus on sending out high impact messages
Here’s something that many people who use social media don’t understand: if you send out too many messages, people might stop following you or might even block you, because you’re flooding their inbox.
The secret is to try to make every message you send, or at least a high percentage of them, high-impact messages. Examples: share really useful links, news related to your field, things that are really funny or inspirational, or inside information about your business or blog. The key is to make sure almost every message is something that people will want to share with their friends.
Limit yourself to high-impact messages to reduce the time you spend communicating.
Step 3. Let go of the need to read everything. Learn to scan
It’s impossible to consume ALL the information that comes at you. It’s like trying to drink from a fire-hose — not only is it a waste of your time, it can be damaging, because you have other important things to do.
So be selective. Find sources of information that are valuable. And scan to get the gist of what’s going on, instead of trying to read every message. Let go of the need to stay on top of everything. Let it go! And instead, just take a dip in the river now and then.
Step 4. Figure out which social media give you the most value, and simplify
I recommend trying the main forms of social media, but only for a little while. It doesn’t hurt to try them out, but you simply can’t keep up with it all, and what’s more, it’s not the best use of your time. Not all forms of social media are effective for all goals, for all people.
Instead, find just one or two or three that are most effective for you. For me, blogging and Twitter are the best. I try to stay in touch with Facebook, but MySpace (MySpace reviews) and the rest are not worthwhile, for me.
Your choices will be different. But in the end, be selective and guard your time wisely.
Step 5. Form close relationships with people who give you the most value, not everyone
I’m not suggesting you only follow a handful of people on Twitter or Facebook. But while you can have a large number of friends, you won’t have the same degree of closeness with all of them. So find the people who give you the most value — who share great info, who make you laugh, who inspire you, who give you great suggestions for improving, who help you on a regular basis, who you enjoy talking to. Then focus on building relationships with them. They’re worth spending time with.
Step 6. Manage your time wisely
It can be easy to do social media too much. Find ways to integrate social media activities in your life without them overwhelming the other work you have to do, and your personal life.
You can set regular schedules, such as doing it 2-3 times a day at certain times, or 10 minutes every hour, or at certain times when there’s a lull in your schedule. But be sure to have boundaries — the rest of your life should be held sacred too.
These days participating in social media such as Twitter, Facebook, blogging and more is almost required for any entrepreneur or business, small or large.
But there’s so much info and chatter coming in through social media that it can overwhelm you, eat up your time, and ruin your productivity.
Simplifying will help you stay in touch, and continue to participate in the conversation, without losing sight of your mission and the important work you need to get done.
Step 1. Use simple tools to make the most of social media
The simpler the tools, the better. But tools that combine two or more social media into one are best, because that means you need fewer tools. An example is TweetDeck (TweetDeck reviews) - not only does it incorporate Twitter (Twitter reviews), but you can see your Facebook (Facebook reviews) friends’ updates at the same time.
Another good example is Digsby, which combines email, IM, and social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn.
My setup uses Gmail (Gmail reviews), as it’s the communication tool that I use most often. I’ve set it up to be my all-in-one inbox: I can Twitter, Facebook, delicious, Flickr, IM and more. You can make Gmail your ultimate productivity center.
Step 2. Focus on sending out high impact messages
Here’s something that many people who use social media don’t understand: if you send out too many messages, people might stop following you or might even block you, because you’re flooding their inbox.
The secret is to try to make every message you send, or at least a high percentage of them, high-impact messages. Examples: share really useful links, news related to your field, things that are really funny or inspirational, or inside information about your business or blog. The key is to make sure almost every message is something that people will want to share with their friends.
Limit yourself to high-impact messages to reduce the time you spend communicating.
Step 3. Let go of the need to read everything. Learn to scan
It’s impossible to consume ALL the information that comes at you. It’s like trying to drink from a fire-hose — not only is it a waste of your time, it can be damaging, because you have other important things to do.
So be selective. Find sources of information that are valuable. And scan to get the gist of what’s going on, instead of trying to read every message. Let go of the need to stay on top of everything. Let it go! And instead, just take a dip in the river now and then.
Step 4. Figure out which social media give you the most value, and simplify
I recommend trying the main forms of social media, but only for a little while. It doesn’t hurt to try them out, but you simply can’t keep up with it all, and what’s more, it’s not the best use of your time. Not all forms of social media are effective for all goals, for all people.
Instead, find just one or two or three that are most effective for you. For me, blogging and Twitter are the best. I try to stay in touch with Facebook, but MySpace (MySpace reviews) and the rest are not worthwhile, for me.
Your choices will be different. But in the end, be selective and guard your time wisely.
Step 5. Form close relationships with people who give you the most value, not everyone
I’m not suggesting you only follow a handful of people on Twitter or Facebook. But while you can have a large number of friends, you won’t have the same degree of closeness with all of them. So find the people who give you the most value — who share great info, who make you laugh, who inspire you, who give you great suggestions for improving, who help you on a regular basis, who you enjoy talking to. Then focus on building relationships with them. They’re worth spending time with.
Step 6. Manage your time wisely
It can be easy to do social media too much. Find ways to integrate social media activities in your life without them overwhelming the other work you have to do, and your personal life.
You can set regular schedules, such as doing it 2-3 times a day at certain times, or 10 minutes every hour, or at certain times when there’s a lull in your schedule. But be sure to have boundaries — the rest of your life should be held sacred too.
Passion Pit (not the band)
In Brandland, the kings of the marketing realm are known as “passion brands”. Although many have tried, few brands have achieved the “passion” status in the hearts and minds of the consumers. If you’ve set your sights on achieving a similar brand clout to cultural icons such as Apple and Zappos then the following seven tips are for you.
The guys at The Blake Project identify a passion brand as one that has a high "life force engagement" factor. Dumb nomenclature aside, their list of markers that distinguish the high engagers is worth reading. A list that starts with Work the Worldview and Differentiate By Design is off to a good start.
From their post:
"The leading passion brands identified in our research for their 'life force engagement' include:
Apple, Sony, American Express, Starbucks, Folger's, Target, Nordstrom, Craig's List, Whole Foods, Toys "R" Us, Camel, Absolut, Kraft, Cadillac, BMW, Acura, Infiniti, Jeep, and Arizona Iced Tea.
There are seven accelerators of Passion Brands, which represent a consumer syntax, a step-by-step process that marketers must honor and follow with the goal of forging a passion brand...
Work the Worldview, not Age, Race, or Gender
The passion brands I studied rarely seem to target consumers in a traditional way, as in women eighteen to thirty-four. More often, they identify shared values about the world...
Differentiate on Design
Consumers respond to clever, intuitive products. Great design engages. There's a joy in a well-designed idea that can trump other performance features. We just want to get our hands on it.
Hire Passionistas as Brand Stewards
...Passion isn't static, in brands or in people. Once people have become passionate about your brand, it takes true passionistas to ensure that the brand continues to grow and evolve in exciting, relevant ways. Don't take your consumers or their passion for your brand for granted.
Know They Know You Need Them
...Get out and watch people in bars, malls, grocery stores, movies, sports events, regardless of the category you're in. Talk to them. Follow them while they shop. Engage them. Notice that you are one of them.
Democratize the Brand
...Real engagement comes from mutating because you're responding to the beat of the people who love you. Let them in....The ability of the consumer to have it 'my way' is a tremendous engine of ownership.
Mine the Mythos
Passion brands have a heritage and they respect it. They know what is in the DNA of the brand and how far they can and should go without putting their genetic code at risk. This doesn't mean they are old and stodgy, just that they know how their personality can legitimately evolve.
Brand the Buzz
...This is about being genuinely interesting and engaging, being a brand that people want to talk about, gossip about, and share with friends. What would they do on Sex and the City?"
Source - Titanium
The guys at The Blake Project identify a passion brand as one that has a high "life force engagement" factor. Dumb nomenclature aside, their list of markers that distinguish the high engagers is worth reading. A list that starts with Work the Worldview and Differentiate By Design is off to a good start.
From their post:
"The leading passion brands identified in our research for their 'life force engagement' include:
Apple, Sony, American Express, Starbucks, Folger's, Target, Nordstrom, Craig's List, Whole Foods, Toys "R" Us, Camel, Absolut, Kraft, Cadillac, BMW, Acura, Infiniti, Jeep, and Arizona Iced Tea.
There are seven accelerators of Passion Brands, which represent a consumer syntax, a step-by-step process that marketers must honor and follow with the goal of forging a passion brand...
Work the Worldview, not Age, Race, or Gender
The passion brands I studied rarely seem to target consumers in a traditional way, as in women eighteen to thirty-four. More often, they identify shared values about the world...
Differentiate on Design
Consumers respond to clever, intuitive products. Great design engages. There's a joy in a well-designed idea that can trump other performance features. We just want to get our hands on it.
Hire Passionistas as Brand Stewards
...Passion isn't static, in brands or in people. Once people have become passionate about your brand, it takes true passionistas to ensure that the brand continues to grow and evolve in exciting, relevant ways. Don't take your consumers or their passion for your brand for granted.
Know They Know You Need Them
...Get out and watch people in bars, malls, grocery stores, movies, sports events, regardless of the category you're in. Talk to them. Follow them while they shop. Engage them. Notice that you are one of them.
Democratize the Brand
...Real engagement comes from mutating because you're responding to the beat of the people who love you. Let them in....The ability of the consumer to have it 'my way' is a tremendous engine of ownership.
Mine the Mythos
Passion brands have a heritage and they respect it. They know what is in the DNA of the brand and how far they can and should go without putting their genetic code at risk. This doesn't mean they are old and stodgy, just that they know how their personality can legitimately evolve.
Brand the Buzz
...This is about being genuinely interesting and engaging, being a brand that people want to talk about, gossip about, and share with friends. What would they do on Sex and the City?"
Source - Titanium
The 6 Dangerous Fallacies of Social Media
Marketing buzz words are dangerous. Too often, marketers are guilty of jumping onto the latest shiny object for the simple fact that it’s new. Although it’s important to take risks and experiment, it’s also important to understand how these new tools work before they are put to use. Arm yourself with an understanding of six social media fallacies for the next time you hear someone says “we need a social media element to this campaign”.
You may have heard of social media. There’s been a bit of news about it recently. However, a lot of people making that news have created expectations and beliefs about social media that aren’t true.
1. Social Media is Inexpensive
False. As Charlene Li said recently, social media trades media cost for labor cost. Done correctly, social media – even a simple reputation monitoring program – is a time intensive proposition that requires daily vigilance.
2. Social Media is Fast
False. Social media is by definition slow. Done correctly, social media is about developing meaningful relationships with customers and prospective customers in their natural habitat. That’s not a “wave the magic wand” scenario. You have to create content, be part of many communities, and proceed incrementally. Many successful social media programs take months (or even more than a year) to really germinate.
3. Social Media is “Viral Marketing”
False, in the same way that a square is also a rectangle, but a rectangle isn’t a square. Can a social media program go viral? Absolutely. But if you’re engaged in a social media program in an effort to go “viral” you’re not really engaged in social media at all. You’re engaged in an advertising and marketing campaign that uses the Web as its distribution platform.
4. Social Media results can’t be measured
False. Especially in comparison to many other communication programs like traditional PR, TV advertising, outdoor advertising and others, social media actually offers pretty solid metrics. Many social media software packages (great ebook analysis of them here) can provide highly detailed reports on the impact of social media programs. Can those results be tied back directly to sales, and therefore ROI? Probably not yet, but other than search and email (and maybe banners) where CAN you do that?
5. Social Media is optional
It doesn’t matter what the demographics of your customers are. It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in. Your customers and prospects are talking about you online. Your company needs to be part of that conversation. Today. Online is where many people do their talking, so that’s where you need to be. If barber shops were still driving consumer sentiment, I’d be writing this post about barber shop marketing. Be where your customers are.
6. Social media is hard
False. It’s not hard, it’s complicated. And that’s only because of the alphabet soup of social networks, lifestreams, sharing sites, etc. Social media is not about Facebook or MySpace or Flickr or Twitter or blogs or YouTube. It’s about having a strategy for making your company or organization more like a person and less like a machine. It’s about humanization.
If your customers and prospects feel like your company is more human and actually cares about them, they’ll want to be part of it. That’s the brand engagement holy grail that we’re all seeking. Too often, the humanization part gets overlooked in an effort to create a “user-generated video contest widget that we’ll launch on Facebook with support from Ustream.” Whatever. Use technology to be yourself, and don’t overthink it.
Source - Convince & Convert
You may have heard of social media. There’s been a bit of news about it recently. However, a lot of people making that news have created expectations and beliefs about social media that aren’t true.
1. Social Media is Inexpensive
False. As Charlene Li said recently, social media trades media cost for labor cost. Done correctly, social media – even a simple reputation monitoring program – is a time intensive proposition that requires daily vigilance.
2. Social Media is Fast
False. Social media is by definition slow. Done correctly, social media is about developing meaningful relationships with customers and prospective customers in their natural habitat. That’s not a “wave the magic wand” scenario. You have to create content, be part of many communities, and proceed incrementally. Many successful social media programs take months (or even more than a year) to really germinate.
3. Social Media is “Viral Marketing”
False, in the same way that a square is also a rectangle, but a rectangle isn’t a square. Can a social media program go viral? Absolutely. But if you’re engaged in a social media program in an effort to go “viral” you’re not really engaged in social media at all. You’re engaged in an advertising and marketing campaign that uses the Web as its distribution platform.
4. Social Media results can’t be measured
False. Especially in comparison to many other communication programs like traditional PR, TV advertising, outdoor advertising and others, social media actually offers pretty solid metrics. Many social media software packages (great ebook analysis of them here) can provide highly detailed reports on the impact of social media programs. Can those results be tied back directly to sales, and therefore ROI? Probably not yet, but other than search and email (and maybe banners) where CAN you do that?
5. Social Media is optional
It doesn’t matter what the demographics of your customers are. It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in. Your customers and prospects are talking about you online. Your company needs to be part of that conversation. Today. Online is where many people do their talking, so that’s where you need to be. If barber shops were still driving consumer sentiment, I’d be writing this post about barber shop marketing. Be where your customers are.
6. Social media is hard
False. It’s not hard, it’s complicated. And that’s only because of the alphabet soup of social networks, lifestreams, sharing sites, etc. Social media is not about Facebook or MySpace or Flickr or Twitter or blogs or YouTube. It’s about having a strategy for making your company or organization more like a person and less like a machine. It’s about humanization.
If your customers and prospects feel like your company is more human and actually cares about them, they’ll want to be part of it. That’s the brand engagement holy grail that we’re all seeking. Too often, the humanization part gets overlooked in an effort to create a “user-generated video contest widget that we’ll launch on Facebook with support from Ustream.” Whatever. Use technology to be yourself, and don’t overthink it.
Source - Convince & Convert
Guiding Principles To Co-Creation
As the barriers between brands and consumers continue to erode (think two-way dialogue) the concept of “co-creation” is going to become increasing relevant to brands. In fact, inviting your consumer into your business process is one very smart move. Prepare yourself for the future with the following 101 on co-creation. Lots of links for further reading here.
Please find below the summary of the White Paper “Co-creation’s 5 Guiding Principles or… what is successful co-creation made of?”. The complete paper can be found here.
In challenging times, new rules apply.
Companies and organisations are searching for tools to help them win their day-to-day battles. They are faced with increasingly challenging questions: where to find future growth? How to deal with the risk of commoditisation? How to innovate from the core? How to get - or stay - connected with customers?
Can co-creation provide the answer? We think it can, but as with many other solutions, co-creation will only truly deliver if it’s done properly. Co-creation is more than just a tool; it is a program of change. We have identified a few strong recommendations to anyone wanting to venture out into this area.
The 4 Types of Co-creation
There are many ways to go about co-creation, and which to choose depends on the challenge and objectives at hand. There is always 1 initiator, i.e. the party that decides to start the initiative. This can be a company or just a single person. One (or many) contributors will be joining along in the process, but the initiator determines who can join and under what conditions. These are the two central dimensions that define types of co-creation:
Open-ness: Can anyone join in or is there a selection criterion somewhere in the process?
Ownership: Is the outcome and challenges owned by just the initiator or by the contributors as well?
These two dimensions lead to the 4 main types of Co-creation:
• Club of experts: Suitable for very specific challenges that demand expertise and breakthrough ideas. Contributors meet certain specific participation criteria and are found through a selection process. Quality of input and chemistry between participants are key to success. (e.g. Nokia)
• Crowd of people: Also known as Crowd Sourcing. This form is all about the Law of Big Numbers: anyone can join, often via an online platform. Crowd Sourcing ‘unleashes the power of the masses’, but you’re not sure that the ‘very best’ people will (want to) contribute. (e.g.Threadless)
• Coalition of parties: In certain complex situations, a “Coalition” of parties teams up, each party adding a specific asset or skill. Co-branding also belongs to this type of co-creation. Key success factors include sharing knowledge and creating a common competitive advantage.
(e.g. Beertender)
• Community of kindred spirits: This form is most relevant when developing something for the greater good. Groups of people with similar interests and complementary areas of expertise can come together and create. (e.g. Linux)
The 5 Guiding Principles in Co-creation
In co-creation, there’s a fine line between ‘doing it right’ and ‘just not cracking it at all’. Successful co-creation initiatives tend to have a number of characteristics in common. We’ve analysed and clustered them into the following “5 Guiding Principles in Co-creation”:
• Inspire participation: Trigger people to join your challenge: open up and show what's in it for them. Offer an open and transparent environment where people feel welcome to contribute to your challenges. (e.g. Alessi invites groups (200+) of pre-selected designers to be working with them on the next generation products.)
• Select the very best: You need the best ideas and the best people to deal with today's complex issues. Involve individuals whose backgrounds and experience somehow connect to the challenge at hand. (e.g. Innocentive is a platform where scientists and other experts are gathered to solve scientific challenges.)
• Connect creative minds: Enable bright people to work together and find that ‘spark’. Share information, ideas, experiences, dreams, strategies, successes and failures in order to learn from each other. (e.g. In 2004, Lego developed a new generation of ‘Mindstorms’ products together with lead users. In 2009 these lead users are still part of the (exclusive) Mindstorms Developer Program.)
• Share results: ‘Giving back’ is crucial - as well as ‘how’ you do it. The most basic step is to keep participants informed of progress and developments. Ultimately, sharing intellectual property would be a next step in co-creation: co-ownership. (e.g. On the Apple iPhone App store platform 3rd parties can develop user applications and set their own price. The profits are shared, 70% is for the developer, 30% for Apple. 1 billion downloads so far, and counting.)
• Continue development: Co-creation only delivers when it is a longer-term engagement, preferably part of a structured process that involves parties in- and outside your company. The co-creation output will become part of the company’s innovation process. Also keep participants in the loop during this (long) process. (e.g. in 2002 P&G started Connect & Develop: an initiative that invites people and companies from outside P&G to innovate with them. “Proudly Developed Elsewhere” is one of their new claims.)
For further reading
For you convenience we have included 5 recommended links:
The 1% Rule:
“Charting Citizen Participation”
Harvard Business Week article:
“Which kind of collaboration is good for you?”
MIT Press article:
“The principles of distributed innovation”
Wired article on Lego:
“Geeks in Toyland”
Harvard Business Week article on P&G:
“Connect and Develop: Inside P&G’s new model for innovation”
Source - FutureLab
Please find below the summary of the White Paper “Co-creation’s 5 Guiding Principles or… what is successful co-creation made of?”. The complete paper can be found here.
In challenging times, new rules apply.
Companies and organisations are searching for tools to help them win their day-to-day battles. They are faced with increasingly challenging questions: where to find future growth? How to deal with the risk of commoditisation? How to innovate from the core? How to get - or stay - connected with customers?
Can co-creation provide the answer? We think it can, but as with many other solutions, co-creation will only truly deliver if it’s done properly. Co-creation is more than just a tool; it is a program of change. We have identified a few strong recommendations to anyone wanting to venture out into this area.
The 4 Types of Co-creation
There are many ways to go about co-creation, and which to choose depends on the challenge and objectives at hand. There is always 1 initiator, i.e. the party that decides to start the initiative. This can be a company or just a single person. One (or many) contributors will be joining along in the process, but the initiator determines who can join and under what conditions. These are the two central dimensions that define types of co-creation:
Open-ness: Can anyone join in or is there a selection criterion somewhere in the process?
Ownership: Is the outcome and challenges owned by just the initiator or by the contributors as well?
These two dimensions lead to the 4 main types of Co-creation:
• Club of experts: Suitable for very specific challenges that demand expertise and breakthrough ideas. Contributors meet certain specific participation criteria and are found through a selection process. Quality of input and chemistry between participants are key to success. (e.g. Nokia)• Crowd of people: Also known as Crowd Sourcing. This form is all about the Law of Big Numbers: anyone can join, often via an online platform. Crowd Sourcing ‘unleashes the power of the masses’, but you’re not sure that the ‘very best’ people will (want to) contribute. (e.g.Threadless)
• Coalition of parties: In certain complex situations, a “Coalition” of parties teams up, each party adding a specific asset or skill. Co-branding also belongs to this type of co-creation. Key success factors include sharing knowledge and creating a common competitive advantage.
(e.g. Beertender)
• Community of kindred spirits: This form is most relevant when developing something for the greater good. Groups of people with similar interests and complementary areas of expertise can come together and create. (e.g. Linux)
The 5 Guiding Principles in Co-creation
In co-creation, there’s a fine line between ‘doing it right’ and ‘just not cracking it at all’. Successful co-creation initiatives tend to have a number of characteristics in common. We’ve analysed and clustered them into the following “5 Guiding Principles in Co-creation”:
• Inspire participation: Trigger people to join your challenge: open up and show what's in it for them. Offer an open and transparent environment where people feel welcome to contribute to your challenges. (e.g. Alessi invites groups (200+) of pre-selected designers to be working with them on the next generation products.)• Select the very best: You need the best ideas and the best people to deal with today's complex issues. Involve individuals whose backgrounds and experience somehow connect to the challenge at hand. (e.g. Innocentive is a platform where scientists and other experts are gathered to solve scientific challenges.)
• Connect creative minds: Enable bright people to work together and find that ‘spark’. Share information, ideas, experiences, dreams, strategies, successes and failures in order to learn from each other. (e.g. In 2004, Lego developed a new generation of ‘Mindstorms’ products together with lead users. In 2009 these lead users are still part of the (exclusive) Mindstorms Developer Program.)
• Share results: ‘Giving back’ is crucial - as well as ‘how’ you do it. The most basic step is to keep participants informed of progress and developments. Ultimately, sharing intellectual property would be a next step in co-creation: co-ownership. (e.g. On the Apple iPhone App store platform 3rd parties can develop user applications and set their own price. The profits are shared, 70% is for the developer, 30% for Apple. 1 billion downloads so far, and counting.)
• Continue development: Co-creation only delivers when it is a longer-term engagement, preferably part of a structured process that involves parties in- and outside your company. The co-creation output will become part of the company’s innovation process. Also keep participants in the loop during this (long) process. (e.g. in 2002 P&G started Connect & Develop: an initiative that invites people and companies from outside P&G to innovate with them. “Proudly Developed Elsewhere” is one of their new claims.)
For further reading
For you convenience we have included 5 recommended links:
The 1% Rule:
“Charting Citizen Participation”
Harvard Business Week article:
“Which kind of collaboration is good for you?”
MIT Press article:
“The principles of distributed innovation”
Wired article on Lego:
“Geeks in Toyland”
Harvard Business Week article on P&G:
“Connect and Develop: Inside P&G’s new model for innovation”
Source - FutureLab
Seeing The Forest From The Trees
We read a lot about the rush to do something ‘on’ the next tech phenomenon - do something on Facebook, have a presence on Twitter or (yes, still) launch a viral marketing campaign. But there is precious little conversation about the impact technology is having long-term on culture, and how this might challenge some of the assumptions we have built marketing programs on for the last few decades.
Pick up any of the trade papers or read any of the marketing blogs recently and you’re likely to notice Amara’s law at work: “we invariably overestimate the short-term impact of new technologies while underestimating their long-term effects”. We read a lot about the rush to do something ‘on’ the next tech phenomenon - do something on Facebook, have a presence on Twitter or (yes, still) launch a viral marketing campaign. But there is precious little conversation about the impact technology is having long-term on culture, and how this might challenge some of the assumptions we have built marketing programs on for the last few decades.
While I would never be foolish enough to claim any ability to predict the future, I think there are four interesting signs of where marketing may be heading.
1. Brands will be built on cultural and social missions, not commercial propositions
Marketing historically has been obsessed with the concept of positioning – how you are different to your competitors in your category. Increasingly, great brands are realizing that people don’t see categories and don’t obsess about them. What actually matters is having a point of view on the world, a cultural mission to ask people to rally around. You can begin to see this come to life in marketing ideas like Dove’s ‘Campaign For Real Beauty’ and, more importantly, embedded into the very DNA of businesses. Howies, a UK clothing brand is a great example. As its founder Dave Hieatt said, “We’re not trying to sell things. We are trying to make people think about stuff.” That belief (make people think about the world around them) is self-evident in everything from the materials they use to their design to their catalogues to store design.
2. Marketing will be about what you do, not what you say
Marketing has for far too long been built on the notion of saying things at people, rather than doing things for or with people. Great marketing will increasingly be about what you do, not what you say. And that means that rather than being a silo within a business, marketing needs to be an ethos pervasive throughout an organization. Great marketing ideas today and in the future are as likely to be ideas that ‘live’ in operations (think Zappos unannounced upgrade to overnight shipping or Amazon’s one-click shopping), retail design (handheld registers in Apple stores to cut down queues and increase staff/customer interaction) or HR (the Zappos culture book).
3. Lots of little ideas, not one big idea
The future of marketing lies in breaking the tyranny of the big idea for two reasons.
First, we must remember that while marketing (and brands) exist for a commercial purpose, they live in a cultural space. And culture is far richer, deeper, complex and nuanced than 99.9% of marketing. Marketing will be more culturally interesting if it is made up of lots of coherent ideas than repeating consistently one idea.
Second, given our inability to predict the future (despite the fortunes spent on research) it makes much more sense to start lots of fires to see what takes hold and place lots of small bets, rather than putting everything on black 35. We need to think about investing lots of small bets, learning from them and then scaling up behind the ideas that seem to be working. (It’s worth noting that this has been made practical by the fact that the internet is reducing the cost of failure to almost zero).
4. People first
Marketing in the future will be about putting people first. This may sound ridiculously obvious, but too often marketing is about convincing people how great you are rather than working out what people are interested in and working out how you might be able to help or add value.
A great example of this was the Tate Tracks campaign created by Fallon London for the Tate Modern gallery. They needed to increase the number of under-25s visiting the gallery and quickly realized that the conventions of gallery marketing – show the art on display – was unlikely to change behavior. So instead they thought about what this audience were passionate about – music – and created a campaign around art inspiring new, exclusive music.
So, there are four signs of where I think marketing may be heading. If I had to sum it up I think the future lies in realizing that creating cultural value will create commercial value. Whatever the future may bring, it’s certainly an exciting time to be in the industry.
Source - The Talent Zoo
Pick up any of the trade papers or read any of the marketing blogs recently and you’re likely to notice Amara’s law at work: “we invariably overestimate the short-term impact of new technologies while underestimating their long-term effects”. We read a lot about the rush to do something ‘on’ the next tech phenomenon - do something on Facebook, have a presence on Twitter or (yes, still) launch a viral marketing campaign. But there is precious little conversation about the impact technology is having long-term on culture, and how this might challenge some of the assumptions we have built marketing programs on for the last few decades.
While I would never be foolish enough to claim any ability to predict the future, I think there are four interesting signs of where marketing may be heading.
1. Brands will be built on cultural and social missions, not commercial propositions
Marketing historically has been obsessed with the concept of positioning – how you are different to your competitors in your category. Increasingly, great brands are realizing that people don’t see categories and don’t obsess about them. What actually matters is having a point of view on the world, a cultural mission to ask people to rally around. You can begin to see this come to life in marketing ideas like Dove’s ‘Campaign For Real Beauty’ and, more importantly, embedded into the very DNA of businesses. Howies, a UK clothing brand is a great example. As its founder Dave Hieatt said, “We’re not trying to sell things. We are trying to make people think about stuff.” That belief (make people think about the world around them) is self-evident in everything from the materials they use to their design to their catalogues to store design.
2. Marketing will be about what you do, not what you say
Marketing has for far too long been built on the notion of saying things at people, rather than doing things for or with people. Great marketing will increasingly be about what you do, not what you say. And that means that rather than being a silo within a business, marketing needs to be an ethos pervasive throughout an organization. Great marketing ideas today and in the future are as likely to be ideas that ‘live’ in operations (think Zappos unannounced upgrade to overnight shipping or Amazon’s one-click shopping), retail design (handheld registers in Apple stores to cut down queues and increase staff/customer interaction) or HR (the Zappos culture book).
3. Lots of little ideas, not one big idea
The future of marketing lies in breaking the tyranny of the big idea for two reasons.
First, we must remember that while marketing (and brands) exist for a commercial purpose, they live in a cultural space. And culture is far richer, deeper, complex and nuanced than 99.9% of marketing. Marketing will be more culturally interesting if it is made up of lots of coherent ideas than repeating consistently one idea.
Second, given our inability to predict the future (despite the fortunes spent on research) it makes much more sense to start lots of fires to see what takes hold and place lots of small bets, rather than putting everything on black 35. We need to think about investing lots of small bets, learning from them and then scaling up behind the ideas that seem to be working. (It’s worth noting that this has been made practical by the fact that the internet is reducing the cost of failure to almost zero).
4. People first
Marketing in the future will be about putting people first. This may sound ridiculously obvious, but too often marketing is about convincing people how great you are rather than working out what people are interested in and working out how you might be able to help or add value.
A great example of this was the Tate Tracks campaign created by Fallon London for the Tate Modern gallery. They needed to increase the number of under-25s visiting the gallery and quickly realized that the conventions of gallery marketing – show the art on display – was unlikely to change behavior. So instead they thought about what this audience were passionate about – music – and created a campaign around art inspiring new, exclusive music.
So, there are four signs of where I think marketing may be heading. If I had to sum it up I think the future lies in realizing that creating cultural value will create commercial value. Whatever the future may bring, it’s certainly an exciting time to be in the industry.
Source - The Talent Zoo
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