Customer Listening Blog

Crowdsourcing getting traction for NPD

In line with my recent post about the trend of consumer driven advertising, consumer insight lead new product development initiatives get more and more traction. Indeed, marketers now view crowdsourcing as a more effective way of creating new products and services than consulting or internal R&D, according to a survey by the Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG).

The percentage of respondents who saw crowdsourcing as effective or highly effective for new product and service development shot up from 62% a year ago to 75%, overtaking R&D which fell slightly from 73% to 72%.

The percentage who rated traditional consulting and professional services firms as effective or highly effective fell from 54% to 49%.

In the same period, familiarity with the term ‘crowdsourcing’ – which describes organisations using web 2.0 tools to tap the knowledge of stakeholders and experts through open invitations for help and ideas – rose from 30% to 72%.

Richard Guha, chairman of MENG, said: “Tapping the wisdom of crowds over the internet can be enlightening for an organisation in many ways, providing marketers with valuable insight to expand their brand mind share and market share. However, like any good customer insight, interactive ideation or predictive analysis effort, it’s important to frame the issue, manage the process and carefully assess the value of the collective data.”

The survey was conducted last month in association with online social network Crowd Forum.

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Wepc.com: crowdsoucring the Asus & Dell way...

An other "crowdsourcing" initiative this time from Asus & Dell..."it starts with one simple Idea: Yours" says the site... Again Co-Creation..but in my mind, Communication rather than Co-Creation to start with really... Co-Creation may be coming in later but the initiative serves first of all a purpose of Communication both on the media scene and among end users: Word of Mouth.

Will be interesting to see where things go from there, and for sure how strongly creating user driven machines will be delivered...key to harvest word of mouth benefits at its best, or to overclaim co-creation without really the means to deliver it...

To visit the site: www.wepc.com 

Impressions from Australia

As you know, I was invited by the AMSRS to give a keynote speech at their annual conference in Melbourne 15th-16th of , as well as run a workshop on 'word of mouth measurement and beyond'.

To say the least the experience was outstanding, all of it, the country, the conference itself and most of all the PEOPLE. Friendly, helpful, curious to learn and interested in others, I really enjoyed my short time in both Melbourne and Sydney and even got the chance to see an AFL match Australian Football match as well as meet and speak with one of the most famous AFL coaches: Kevin Sheddy.

When I came in I really though that Australia was more advanced in terms of rolling new methods and approaches in market research. This impression came from the fact that internet penetration is high in Australia, and the anglo saxon experience and background from the UK and the US. In fact, it seems that from the feedback I got my speech about LISTENING, (From Asking to Listening: Leveraging insights from a connected world) was really appreciated by the audience and inspirational for some. What a great feedback!

So my only advice is indeed Australia can really get involved in the Listening game and has a great chance to play to further influence and join the Asian region opportunities of growth. It seems clearly that the Australian government is going this way, I believe that the country has most to gain out of it and for sure will be not as far away at it seems (it is still 20 hours from Europe, 8 hours from Singapore). My only hope is really to comeback, it seems that opportunities are present after the initial contacts I had after the conference, so who knows may be in 2009 or 2010 even before for projects and consulting hopefully!

By the way, the ARF in the US is running a one day forum on LISTENING in late October (you see you got the message about Listening before America! :), so really, guys you are not really late in the game, the US is really going full speed in this direction, you have everything in place to join the crowd... so jump! Don't you have Kangoros in your country?

So to everyone I met, the AMSRS staff and members: THANK YOU.

and specifically to John (Marinopoulos & Dimopoulos), Andy (conferece chair), Elissa, Peter (president) Leslea, Francesca, Leanne, everyone really (sorry for the ones that I forgot here) you made this trip really special and full of learning, thank you very much! and feel free to ask again, I am actively listening!

Crmmetrix & brandDelphi featured in International Herald Tribune!

A great article from Thomas Crampton features crmmetrix and specifically our "active listening" solution brandDelphi in today International Herald Tribune.

The article briefly describes how brandDelphi leverages consumers' ideas to drive winning products and advertising with specific examples from representatives of P&G and Columbia Business School.

To read the article in full

To know more about brandDelphi

technorati tags: herald tribune crmmetrix brandDelphi Delphi brand Delphi P&G Tremor Columbia Business School

Community Management & Marketing Council

François Gossieaux is launching the Community Management & Marketing Council, if interested join the call, below a few details from François:

As I may have told you we have a web site up at www.cmmcouncil.org. We are now in the stage where we feel comfortable to set up a preliminary meeting with those companies that have indicated interest in the association. To kick off the planning for the council, we are having an introductory teleconference on Tuesday, February 13th at 1pm EST (10am PST), Dial-in Number: (605) 990-0100, Access Code: 446070#.

What is CMMC and who is it for?  Made for companies that are leveraging communities for business purposes, it's a center to share best practices, find resources and vendors, and establish its members as industry leaders. We are seeing strong interest from folks who already facilitate online conversations between large groups of customers (like Intuit, SAP and Nokia's N-Gage gamers), researchers in the space (MIT Sloan and Wharton), marketers who aim to transform groups of subscribers or employees into a more valuable community (like Levi's), and the applications and services vendors and consultants who will help them do so, (like Deloitte, LiveWorld and Patricia Seybold).

If you plan to join our call, we would appreciate an RSVP to me, [email protected] , or to CMMC's co-founder Isabel Hilborn [email protected], but a reply is not required.  There is absolutely no obligation and the call is free.

Also, François is hosting a conference on Communities in Vegas on March 12-14th:

TO REGISTER

technorati tags: François Gossieaux Community Management Marketing Council CMM Council Community 2.0 La Vegas

Which city will win the Super Bowl?... Miami, maybe!

Although everyone talks about the Colts or the Bears and the cities they play in... I really think that the city of Miami, that is not in the final, but simply holds the event, may the biggest winner of the buzz and attention that the Super Bowl drives... the only "issue" is that it is currently raining in Miami... so this may not help the city shine the way it does when it is sunny .. :)

Look at the buzz surrdouning the three cities of Miami, Chicago, and Indianapolis... clearly the Super Bowl drives buzz:

By the way, who do you think will win beyond Miami?

technorati tags: miami chicago indianapolis super bowl

P&G really gets it:"Relationship Research" in a web 2.0 environment

Yesterday again I was highlighting the power of leveraging the natural willingness of consumers to engage with brands when they come to meet the brand on the brand website, again, P&G shows us the way to what what I call "Relationship Research" rather than "Transaction Research" as most research has been conducted until recently...

Indeed rather than "buying insights" (as you pay fieldwork to conduct research, thsu results and insights, and pay respondents), here you learn, LISTEN, and leverage insights: virtual ethnography (netnography) at its best, as you live with consumers, set up a relationship for the long term, not through "projects", but through exchange, respect, and long term relationship.

Marketers and Researchers should indeed learn from these initiatives, very much in line with what I call Research 2.0 or the web 2.0 of Market Research. 

Below an article by SUZANNE VRANICA in Wall Street Journal that explains the recent P&G initiatives on Social Media
January 8, 2007; Page B4

P&G Boosts Social-Networking Efforts: Latest Site Shift Tack from Brand Promotion to Market Research

Procter & Gamble, in its biggest foray into the hot Web phenomenon of social networking, is launching two Web sites aimed at creating online communities where the consumer-products titan can learn more about its customers and market to them.

One site will be celebrity and fan-club driven, tied to P&G's decades-old People's Choice Awards, and the other is Capessa, a women-oriented site produced by Procter & Gamble for the Health section of Yahoo. Capessa, designed to be a forum for women to discuss subjects such as parenting, pregnancy and weight loss, had been tested for several months and went up Dec. 21. The People's Choice Community site formally kicks off Wednesday, a day after CBS broadcasts this year's award ceremony. (The awards are given to TV stars based on votes from viewers.)

The social-network scene so far has been dominated by the likes of News Corp.'s MySpace.com and Facebook Inc.'s Facebook.com, which draw millions of visitors, although a long list of niche sites are increasingly proving a draw. Marketers also are starting to build their own sites, using them as gathering places for consumers to spread buzz about certain products or brands. This move by P&G, the world's biggest advertiser, with an annual ad budget of $6.7 billion, is likely to draw even more marketers into the arena.

P&G, of Cincinnati, makes a vast array of consumer goods, including Pampers diapers, Folgers coffee and Tide detergent. The two new Web sites follow smaller steps by several P&G brands into social networking recently. P&G's Crest toothpaste brand, for example, launched a MySpace page last year that featured a fictional character called Miss Irresistible encouraging friends to take a quiz. Separately, P&G's Herbal Essences shampoo brand created a MySpace page that allowed people to show off pictures of their hairstyles.

Unlike those efforts, P&G's new sites will be less about promoting specific brands and more about market research. Both new sites will act as continuing focus-group-type environments where P&G -- by monitoring consumer discussions on the sites -- can learn more about its target audience's likes and dislikes and what consumers in different stages of life care about.

P&G is already an expert in studying consumer behavior, using such methods as visiting consumers at home, but its new sites offer the chance to do research quicker and on a bigger scale. P&G will use the information to design marketing plans that resonate better with its audience. "It's going to be one giant living dynamic learning experience about consumers," says Jim Stengel, P&G's global marketing officer.

The sites will do some marketing for P&G. The People's Choice site, which will feature Queen Latifah as a host, will carry regular banner ads for P&G and non-P&G products. P&G also hopes the site will bolster the awards show's sagging ratings, which have fallen 36% since 2000, according to Nielsen Media Research.

Marketing on Capessa will be more subtle. P&G won't run ads for its products on Capessa pages. Indeed, the only mention of P&G on the Capessa site is a line at the bottom of Web pages that identifies Capessa as being produced by a P&G company. Yahoo, which is promoting the site as a big feature of its health section, says it doesn't want to over-commercialize the site given the serious nature of subjects being discussed.

Capessa will occasionally offer some links to P&G experts offering tips about specific issues such as parenting or offer up a P&G newsletter on a particular subject. "Much like when a consumer is searching for something today with Google, Yahoo or MSN, brands serve up a message while they are searching to help that consumer but they do it in a way that is engaging and not disruptive," Mr. Stengel says. "If we cross that line we kill the experience."

Success for P&G's new sites is no slam dunk. Retail giant Wal-Mart Stores pulled the plug on a teen-targeted social-networking site, "The Hub," last year after it failed to gain steam. Capessa's focus on women pits it against numerous other rivals, including NBC Universal's women-focused Web site iVillage.

P&G believes it has an advantage because both of its sites will be produced by P&G Productions, a unit formed in 1933 that is best known for producing popular soap operas such as "As the World Turns" and "Guiding Light."

Indeed, both sites will have a slicker look than well-established social-networking sites, reflecting the older audience of 18- to 49-year-olds that P&G is aiming for, compared with the teenagers and twentysomethings that crowd sites like MySpace. As a result, on Capessa, instead of encouraging women to post homemade videos, P&G will offer them the chance to be interviewed by P&G's production firm.

"The 18-to-49 core of the demo is not going to want to sift through some of the garbage on YouTube to find some inspirational videos," says Scott Moore, head of news and information for Yahoo Media Group. The site is currently offering video stories such as "How I Lost My Baby Weight -- Julie's Story," "Running for Her Life: a Cancer Comeback" and "Mommy Meltdown -- Leiah's Story."

Yahoo's venture with P&G on Capessa comes as the Web portal is trying to gain ground in social networking by joining with consumer brands in the creation of specific sites. P&G's content-development partnership with Yahoo is the biggest social-networking deal Yahoo has done with a marketer to date, says Mr. Moore, who declined to discuss terms of the P&G deal.

Other Web giants have taken a similar tack. Last year, Google teamed with Nike to create Joga.com, a social-networking site dedicated to avid soccer fans.

technorati tags: P&G market research Research 2.0 Online research customer listening Web 2.0 Respondent Cooperation Netography brandDelphi Capessa People's Choice Yahoo

IAB UK 2nd Annual Engage Conference: London, November 14th 2006

I will be on the User Generated Content Panel at the IAB UK Engage 2006 in London Tuesday November 14th 2006. The panel will close a full day of interesting sessions and speeches with key industry leaders.

The conference sounds really exciting with over 400 registered participants: to access the full programme.

technorati tags: IAB UK Engage 2006 CGM User Generated Content Word of Mouth wom

Atelier SEMO: Marketing 2.0: Ecoute, Conversation, et Influence

Le traditionnel RDV annuel des professionnels du marketing, des études de marché et des sondages d'opinion le SEMO a lieu ces mardi et mercredi 7 et 8 Novembre au palais des congrès de Paris.

Venez nous y rencontrer et décrouvrir nos solutions d'écoute client (stand E22) qui nous ont entre autres permis d'être élus société d'études marketing la plus innovante de l'année 2006.

Guillaume Weill et moi même animons un atelier le Mardi 7 Novembre à 14h45 à accès libre et gratuit:

Marketing 2.0: Ecoute, Conversation, et Influence:

"Le consommateur prend le contrôle de sa relation aux marques. Pour évoluer, apprenez à Ecouter et Converser plutôt qu’à « parler ». Qui écouter, Où, Comment, et Pourquoi ? Au travers d'exemples réels, nous expliquerons comment mettre en place une stratégie d'écoute clients gagnante."

Pour aller sur le site du SEMO

tags technorati : semo 2006 Marketing 2.0 crmmetrix

Google Software To Check Truth Of Politician's Statements

More and more proofs and directions that the online world will continue to shape our lives and Politics specifically:

Reported by MediaPost 10/4/06 from Financial Times Article with Google boss Eric Schmidt

"IMAGINE BEING ABLE TO CHECK instantly if politicians were telling the truth. That is the sort of service Google Inc. boss Eric Schmidt believes the Internet will offer within five years. Politicians don't yet appreciate the impact of the online world, which will also affect the outcome of elections, Schmidt told the Financial Times yesterday. He predicted that "truth predictor" software would, within five years, "hold politicians to account." People would be able to use programs to check seemingly factual statements against historical data to determine whether they were correct."