Last week I attended a blogger meet up sponsored by Forrester Research's Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff. Blogs are a powerful way to interact, but will never replace face to face meetings. I had a chance to catch up with Renee Blodgett and Ken Kaplan and meet bloggers Ben Metcalfe, Karl Long, and Neil Blecherman.
Among trays of pizzas and plates of calamari was a stack of advanced copies of Charlene's and Josh's new book, Groundswell, which is also the name of their blog.
Groundswell is a "movement." For Charlene and Josh, "It's a social trend in which people use technologies to get the things they need from each other, rather than from traditional institutions like corporations."
The book is an excellent primer for those seeking to understand the basic elements of social media, where we are seeing a shift in the balance of power from company to customer.
Beyond extensive discussions on tools, demographics, analysis and advice on how to successfully manage social media, I was struck by an observation they made about General Motor CEO Bob Lutz's highly successful corporate blog, FastLane.
In their assessment, FastLane hasn't revolutionized GM or changed the competitive dynamics. What it has done is revolutionize the communications process.
Herein lies the challenge. Is it possible for a revolution in the communications process to change the competitive landscape? And in pitching social media to management, should it be positioned as incremental change or game changing?
I tend to agree that blogs in and of themselves will not turn poorly run companies into well managed ones or challenger brands into market leaders. They are, after all, only tools, and they must accompany substantive changes in how companies treat their customers. But not tapping the groundswell can severely challenge your market position, particularly in a highly competitive industry.
Philip Soffer, vice president of product development at Lithium, has a lot of experience with this question. His company builds forums for some of the biggest corporations who are seeking to tap the power of online communities. Lithium is also hosting a web seminar with Josh.
From Phil's perspective, community impact on the competitive landscape varies from industry to industry. With GM, social media probably won't change the competitive landscape when so many other factors are at work. But in the case of wireless carriers, "the absence of a community is now a serious competitive disadvantage." AT&T for example is a real leader in this effort, and "now all wireless carriers understand that they can mitigate a lot of their image problems by being more open, and communities are key to that."
Groundswell also addresses how to spread a customer centric focus within your organization. The authors support an incremental approach building support step by step. I also contend that how you position this shift in communications with management depends on where in the organization you are looking for approval.
As Phil emailed me.In customer support, where communities have a very clear ROI, management tends to be more conservative. They talk less about transforming the business and more about the bottom line. On the other hand, many companies have "customer experience" groups that report to marketing, and they talk about communities as transformational, because they're part of a larger strategy of openness. We've heard a number of our customers say, 'We're using the community for support and self-service, but we view its larger function as marketing.' These are companies that want to 'forumize' their whole Web sites. If they're successful, it really can be transformational.
This is also a point that Thor Muller, CEO of Satisfaction made to me. If the impetus for change is coming from customer support, then cost reduction is a key driver. Marketing tends to take a more expansive approach when it comes to implementing social media.
Groundswell is recognition that social and economic forces are changing the way companies do business. What remains open to discussion is the extent that companies can anticipate the steady flow of new tools that put more power in the hands of consumers. For management that is unsure, ignorant or afraid of this shift in power, the burden is on corporate communications to devise an approach that does not alienate senior executives. Equally important, it is up to us to demonstrate the relationship between social media, overall business objectives and company culture.
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