consumers

community software applications

Business Development Ideas

Younger Generations Use Technology Differently

jim wilde — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 20:38:28 +0000

Not only do younger generations perceive technology differently from their elders, but they use it differently, too.

Younger generations [future customers and employees] rarely notice the technology in the devices they use. Baby boomers raised in the 1960s only saw the programming and didn't think much, if at all, about the technology and infrastructure that brought them Bonanza, The Ed Sullivan Show and Laugh-In.
Not only do younger generations perceive technology differently from their elders, including the CIOs and other executives who manage IT organizations and corporations, but they use it differently, too.

Wikinomics author Don Tapscott tells a story of a young woman who doesn't use e-mail, instead relying on instant messaging, texting and posting on Facebook [social networking application and community] to communicate. "E-mail is for old people," she told Tapscott. "Maybe I'd send an e-mail as a thank you note to the parents of a friend.""

"Age Determines Technology's Value" from CIOInsight.

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community software applications

Mashability to Mashups

jim wilde — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 16:01:29 +0000

The NY Times has an interesting article about mashups - Do the Mash (Even if You Don't Know All the Steps) "POP music has its mash-ups that combine tunes and vocals from different songs. YouTube viewers do it, too, mixing together segments from various music videos."Anyway, these mashups are happening all over the place using wikis, blogs, collaborative tools, and social networks. The biggest challenge in organizations is getting applications data base opened up using standard api's.From an IBM spokesperson, "People want to be able to write programs to exploit new business opportunities, he said. - Companies have lots of databases they want to make mashable, he said, - and share with their business partners.

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collaborative software

New media marketing

jim wilde — Wed, 21 Jun 2006 20:58:21 +0000

"THE NEW FACE OF MARKETING SMILES ON CUSTOMER VALUE"

By Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D.

"Whether it's the social network access of peer-to-peer marketing or the youth culture of wireless messaging, companies have never had more options to choose from when connecting with customers. But making those choices should not necessarily be a question of new technology, lower cost, or even media preference, per se. The choice should be made based on the most efficient use of your customer opportunities.

Some "new" marketing channels are now tried-and-true. A recent Forrester Research report, Interactive Marketing Channels to Watch, shows that 83 ercent of the 259 companies it surveyed use email marketing and more than two thirds plan to increase their online activities. In terms of emerging marketing channels the report shows that social networks, RSS feeds, and advertising within video games will get the most attention and dollars over the next five years. Media, communications, and consumer packaged goods firms are the most willing to experiment with new channels because it enables them to find the most specific groups of customers."

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Web 2.0 and Service Oriented Architectures (SOA)

jim wilde — Fri, 28 Apr 2006 08:12:46 +0000

John Hagel - Edge Perspectives, has a great post about, "...the relationship between Web 2.0 and Service Oriented Architectures (SOA)?"

"SOA Versus Web 2.0?"

Mr. Hagel, "...a cultural chasm separates these two technology communities, despite the fact that they both rely heavily on the same foundational standard - XML. The evangelists for SOA tend to dismiss Web 2.0 technologies as light-weight “toys” not suitable for the “real” work of enterprises. The champions of Web 2.0 technologies, on the other hand, make fun of the “bloated” standards and architectural drawings generated by enterprise architects, skeptically asking whether SOAs will ever do real work.

Connection of resources

When you talk to SOA proponents today, you will hear a lot about connecting applications and databases, but not a lot about connecting people together and helping to support their interactions with each other. In contrast, Web 2.0 advocates put a lot more emphasis on the opportunity to connect people together and to support their collaborative efforts. Web 2.0 certainly also addresses issues of connecting applications and data, but Web 2.0 is distinctive in the social dimension that it explicitly addresses.

The next wave of innovation by enterprises will depend on the ability to connect people together more effectively, [social networking software] especially at the edge of enterprises, and provide them with tools to support collaborative creation."

Mr. Hagel goes on to say that business line execs are increasing "...frustrated with the escalating hype around SOAs, the growing spending over SOA design initiatives and the relatively limited business impact achieved by SOA deployments. In contrast, Web 2.0 initiatives are leading to a proliferation of mashups (one form of composition), as described by Dion Hinchcliffe in "The Web 2.0 Mashup Ecosystem Ramps Up" and "Some Predictions for the Coming 'Mashosphere' " "

What's missing here is that most of the web 2.0 technology is not coming from traditional software businesses with spiffy brochures, fancy websites, polished sales reps, and a gigantic marketing budget but from small open source communities or individuals (hackers.)

"Running a business on Web-based software", Posted by Dion Hinchcliffe - ZDNET

"Social vs. Technical Aspects of Enterprise Web 2.0

The tenets of Web 2.0 can be exhibited in a variety of ways that range across a spectrum with social aspects at one end to primarily technical ones at the other (see diagram left). Web 2.0 software for the enterprise can effectively demonstrate aspects across part of this range, most of it, or just a snippet of it. But the generally idea is that Web 2.0 software is online, open, made of pieces, encourages constructive social interaction, and is driven sightly more by its users and data than specific features. Wikis are a great example of this latter concept; their biggest two features are the edit and save
buttons, with the data and people gathering there being far more important."

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connecting applications

data

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Social Media Tools

Nouveau Niche

jim wilde — Thu, 21 Jul 2005 18:59:55 +0000

Hat Tip to Hugh from gapingvoid on his post about Global Microbrands and the link to Trendwatch.com. Hugh, my corp friends that are stuck behind firewalls cannot access your site. They are more interested in your cartoons than anything. Hugh captures the sinking feelings that are permeating boardrooms. NOUVEAU NICHE from Trendwatching.com "BusinessWeek called it 'The Vanishing Mass Market', Wired Magazine spoke of the Lost Boys and the Long Tail. Others talk about Niche Mania, Stuck in the Middle, or Commoditization Chaos. We at TRENDWATCHING.COM dubbed it NOUVEAU NICHE: the new riches will come from servicing the new niches! And while all of this may smack of wordplay, the drivers behind this trend stretch widely and profusely, and have been building for years. So even though you may be more or less familiar with the below, it's definitely time to incorporate NOUVEAU NICHE into your corporate vocabulary AND your business strategy. The move towards everything niche should definitely rank right up there with other mega trends like GENERATION C, MASSCLUSIVITY, MASTERS OF THE YOUNIVERSE and so on. What's fueling NOUVEAU NICHE? 1. Consumers are more individualized than ever, expecting every good, service and experience to be addressing their unique and oh so important selves. Gone are the traditional demographic segments, the distinct consumer classes: this is all about being MASTERS OF THE YOUNIVERSE. Gone too are the days when, as BusinessWeek so eloquently put it; "the ideal was not merely to keep up with the Joneses, but to be the Joneses." In a NOUVEAU NICHE world, where the demise of institutions and their stifling conventions has unlocked latent hyper individualization, where it is all about 'me' (for better or worse), where being special will lend consumers status, to be mass is now every consumer's nightmare. Witness GRAVANITY, witness MASSCLUSIVITY. Even the few mass objects of desire that still manage to unite large groups of consumers -- iPods, Nokia handsets, or the Mini Cooper -- are likely to be customized and personalized the moment they leave the warehouse, website or store. Consumers are also more experienced than ever. They expertly cut through the crap, ignore advertising, and know which quality and price levels are fair."What can you do about it? Read my post on Complexity Theory Meets Spiderman.

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Connecting Innovation to People, Places, & Things

jim wilde — Wed, 20 Jul 2005 14:55:38 +0000

The idea of connecting people, places and things is real. Get an account on any of the social networks to see for yourself. The web is writeable and information flows like water. People are doing things that were never before imagined. They are creating and sharing ideas via blogs, videos, podcasts, etc. Business managers and project teams should take notice because these social applications can help them improve customer service, product development, and information flows.

can consumer creativity become mass? from influx. "... most people believe that you are either really creative or your not. There is no middle ground and after being told that you are not creative, often there's no turning back."

This is a key point to understand, one that prevents most of us from picking up the colored markers. We're gonna change that mindset for people, businesses, organizations, education, and governments (meaning scales).

Influx, "However, this might all change if some new entities emerge.

Tier One: Find new stars

Who:"New Middlemen/Editors"

They sift through the mass talent; find and nurture the ones that could make it. Once a few of these people make it, this could be the signal for a lot more people to get involved.

Tier Two: Give potential stars the means of production and distribution

Who: "New Distributors/Publishers/Studios"

They allow consumers to publish, create and distribute. These include; Lulu.com and cafepress.com and Amazon is also moving into this space with its purchases of Custom Flix and BookSurge.

Tier Three: Educate the wannabes to take it to the next level

Who:"Artistic educators"

With increasing opportunities for personal expression among the mainstream consumer base, there could be a role for creative educators to help consumers add new skills and to critique their work. Imagine webeducation courses, etc...

Tier Four: Empower Everyone

Who:"Brand Personalizers"

I believe what they are talking about is
making connections on the long tail. If you need a spark, read Hugh's "how to be creative" and I promise you that you'll never think the same again about creativity and a lot of other things.

Dave Pollard from How To Save The Word, writes, Why Is Innovation So Hard to Sell?

"People don't like to change.
Everyone thinks they can do it themselves.
It's a 'dragon' issue, so it involves a lot of trust. It's frightening to open your kimono to a stranger.
It requires understanding of how and why the market has moved on without you.

it's probably not your fault -- it's the market and the competitors that have changed, probably in disruptive and unforeseeable ways,
customers also hate change, and it's painful to discover that they're getting something from a competitor that's so much better, cheaper or whatever than what you offer that they've made (or are about to make) the switch,
it's unnerving to realize that customers ultimately have life-and-death power over your business, and often behave unpredictably, and
it's difficult and to start looking at your customers and market through a strange new perspective -- which is where you have to start if you really want to innovate."

We define the customer with what we have to sell!

"What's happened here? We've defined the demographic and affinity segments in terms of what we have to sell, rather than how these affinity groups define themselves. And we've defined their needs in terms of the features and attributes we can offer, instead of much more broadly in the emotional terms that the customers define and recognize their needs themselves. This is a fatal error, but one which our intense customer focus almost drives us to commit."

Kathy on headrush has a post, "
What can software learn from kung fu?" about taking things to the next level. There are tools and services everywhere to help us all run to the next level.

Kathy, "So what's your next level? Do your users know what the levels are? Too often, users could get excited and motivated if only they knew more. If you hear a user say something like, "But I never you could do that!", consider that a problem. How many more people would have stuck around if they'd known? With your software, product, service, club, subject you teach, whatever... is there a steady series of new possibilities out there worth reaching for, and more importantly, are you doing something to help users get there?"

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It's a small world afterall

jim wilde — Fri, 15 Apr 2005 15:43:12 +0000

From Co-Creation Trend 3: Control by Jennifer Rice from What's Your Brand Mantra? "There are millions of unpaid volunteers who want to help create products and content that they want to buy. Yes, it means relinquishing some control. But it also means an incredible amount of energy and momentum to the companies who are brave enough to work with it."Ms. Rice is so right, but in my experience, managers suffer from the "has to be invented here" syndrome, or don't have a clue about new tools that are available to help them find, discover, and implement new ideas. It gets worse, the bigger the company. Confusion and chaos rule, when employees have no outlet for their own ideas. Frustration ensues. "There's a massive, networked conversation going on, and people are joining the conversation for various reasons. People seeking information are meeting up with subject-matter experts. Others are sharing opinions, joining like-minded groups and collaborating on new ideas. Our society is reconnecting itself not by geography, but by interest. It's a meeting of the minds that will spawn a lot of incredible new ideas."My own experience with the conversation has been working on a new commercial product and service for the last eighteen months with people I've met over the Net. They're from all over the world, speak many languages. Most of them are software developers who contribute to open source software projects. We communicate via the Net using blogs, forums, and IM. Today, they are my friends. We developed credibility through word-of-mouth, so to speakj, where one developer leads to the next one. You move in and out of circles, enriching and contributing where and when you can. These contributions, some monetary, are your currency - your reputation, which gives you access to greater resources.Seth Godin asks "Are your people like your customers? ... Most organizations want to grow. What happens, though, when your worldview and biases are so different from the places you're hoping to grow?" The days of slow change are over. In fact, the market place is moving faster than most businesses can adapt. Globalization, deregulation, transparency (AIG lately), aging boomers, and new communications methods are forcing businesses to adapt or perish. With more CEO's gettin' the boot, and private equity (think Circuit City) and hedge funds with tons of cash, change will be swift. What will we be left with?"Lecture 2: Collaboration", is part of a five part lecture series from Channel 4 of the BBC given by the distinguished engineer, Lord Broers. "These advances involved many people in many laboratories. One model says that ten times the effort needed in the original research must be expended in developing a prototype technology, and ten times this effort is needed to produce the manufactured product. The idea that a single person can 'invent' a new technology, is out of the question in these cases. Creative ideas of course come from individuals but their ideas must fit into the matrix of creativity being generated by individuals and teams all over the world."With the tools available today, companies can bring their people and others together to collaborate so easily...even if they are on different continents. Yet, so many companies are either not aware of the technology available or perhaps are just not seeing the possibilities of open innovation. We hope to change that.

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