A definite great read..

-Bill-Bartmann

A definite great read…

-Bill-Bartmann

I chuckled as I read your post as I too got a request from a distinguished person with significant credentials to come and read their blog and give my feedback. Normally I’m not keen on this on first meeting someone as it feels like they’re only interested in having me promote what they’re doing or saying. But there approach was very warm and seemed sincere so I decided to visit. They too were writing just to boomers and wanted feedback, but when I read how they responded to people’s comments who didn’t share their view or who were not in their age demographic, I was somewhat disturbed and decided not to comment. After hearing what happened to you, I’m glad I didn’t waste my time as it may have well been the same individual.

Great thoughts Derek. Thanks for inviting me and keep up the good work

We must build Bigger Communities to succeed. Any community comes all degrees of understanding, mis-understanding, and potential discord. So, managing social media IS a real corporate concern. It will require a lot of time, and it will require investment.

Transparency will be required for any real ROI. So, the question is: Will businesses (corporate or individual) become Better Entities as a result of that requirement? Less short-sheeting? Less rehasing of old tired (often plagarized) ideas? More open? More customer-centric?

In actually, they must. We with traditional mktg backgrounds (and social media skills) recognize so clearly, the first sentence in the first paragraph of Mktg 101: Customer Driven.

And, if some customers are ill informed – that’s an opportunity to inform. If some are belligerent – that’s an opportunity to offer a brief reply with sincere intent to help, and then disengage.

I blog and connect on social channels to grow my network of friends, business partners, and clients. Because that line is very blurry – I generally treat all three groups as one. As long as the relationships are active, they’re healthy.

Resources are the answer. Moderation, facilitation and answering to all forms of opinion will be necessary to keep the transparent interactions coming. Where do those resources come from? I suspect companies will start migrating their customer service centers from a traditional calla nd answer center to a proactive monitor, comment, facilitate and yes…empower center. Classic CRM revolved around quick resolutions. In the new world it will be to answer the question, keep the conversation going (facilitating) and taking the value and reporting back to the organization.

For example, if a customer doesn’t like the generic cookies Walmart has put out, the Walmart representative will engage, ask what needs to change and take that feedback and put it in the hands of a group of folks charged with innovation. Listening, engaging and having follow up actions based on that engagement will allow continued transparency. Simply ending the conversation at the cookie complaint won’t do anyone any good, nor would it endear the customer to Walmart. But actually listening and if enough customer feedback warrants change-then change builds brand affinity and continued two way conversations between customers and Walmart.

The bottom line is a commitment to 2 way interaction involves resources to listen and react within the corporate policy. Here is what you do with negative sentiment, here is what you do with positive sentiment. Here is what you do when the competition engages. What cannot happen is having company policy stifling the conversation, because in the end, people are talking. They will talk about your brand somewhere else, so it is better to listen, engage and react than be blind to the conversation all together.

Thank you to everyone who participated in today’s lively debate. I will be back on later to answer more questions.

Social proof is one of the very powerful weapons that Robert Cialdini writes about in “The Psychology of Influence”. People sometimes use the clout mob psychology offers because it can positively impact their sales – be it for a physical product, a political ideology, or anything in between. That’s why you see so many testimonials in advertisements.

If she published your response it could both challenge her authority and potentially plant seeds of doubt in the minds of her followers. Bottom line is it could hurt her business.

Was she right? Not in my opinion. Actually, I think she was rather rude. After all she did invite your participation. To me her reaction was inexcusable. And, from a freedom of speech perspective, she was 100% wrong. However, from her point of view what you wrote apparently was construed as a threat, hence her emotional response.

Putting it all into perspective, though, what are the requirements for becoming a blogger? I think the only requirement is that you’re breathing – and even that’s not always the case. There’s software that can spit out and automate blogs faster than you can blink your eyes.

Once you’ve decided to become a blogger, there are sites that invite you to blog for free. And, if you pay for your hosting, all it takes is less than ten bucks a year for an URL and a small monthly fee for a hosting account and you’re in business. There are no other restrictions that I’m aware of. Virtually anyone can do it.

I haven’t seen any terms of service that referred to moral responsibility or mutual respect (other than the restrictions about pornography, hate, etc.) Morality and being psychological well-balanced doesn’t seem to enter into the picture.

You state that “you want to be as transparent as possible” when blogging. Although transparency may be important to you and me, it’s not on everybody’s agenda.

I would love to live in a world where we all respected each others opinions and did not impinge on other people’s rights (provided they were not hurting anyone else). I am a baby boomer and unfortunately I haven’t seen that happen in my lifetime.

It doesn’t mean that I’ve given up hope that it could. Perhaps the Internet, people with your attitude towards openness – and blogging – can make it happen. And maybe if more people embrace transparency it will.

I guess we’ll just have to be proactive and wait and see how this grand experiment unfolds over time.