Ask(?)Away: What's Next?, Ryan Karpeles -- Part One

Blogs may make you famous to your customer community. When you share insights on what you have learned and information about your industry experience, you may gain readers who will in turn spread the word about your business. So why doesn't every company have a blog that should have one? I discussed this very topic with Ryan Karpeles of Living Light Bulbs recently.

Ryan contributes an insane amount of (intelligent) questions to our conversations, as he put in a post on job interviews this past week. I sat down to chat with him late one evening as we wondered together about What's Next? for marketing.

Valeria Maltoni: In your post on What's next? you ask a series of questions. I think one that everyone would consider the million dollar questions is -- What happens when every company has a blog? Many content publishers and people who live this environment as an opportunity think that that is the correct direction. Is it? And secondly, what then?

Ryan Karpeles: First of all, simply having a blog is not the point. The point is to always be listening. Always. Interaction is paramount. We all know that one-way messaging is essentially dead, but it's hard to talk ourselves out of that mentality and actually practice what we preach. Having a blog is one way to walk that walk. It's a means to an end. The strategy is what counts. Since the strategy is to listen, the tool is a blog. It's not the only tool, but it's a pretty darn good one. At least for now.

Just to be clear, we're assuming that these blogs are actually providing value in the first place. They're not just placeholders waiting for people to visit and praise your company for having a dialog. If the dialog is worthless and hardly any value is added, what's the point in having a blog? Not every company should have a blog. But if they're not getting enough feedback, or failing to connect with customers, a blog might certainly be a step in the right direction.

So what happens when every company that needs to have a blog has one?

The bar will have already been raised much higher. By that time, blogs (or something of similar value) will be almost mandatory. They'll be an integral part of the marketing mix for companies all over the world. So what will we do then? We'll have to keep finding ways to get closer to the consumer, and keep wow-ing them on a frequent (but unpredictable) basis. The CEO of Pepsi will invite customers over for a home-cooked meal at his house (and they'll get to request the menu). The Customer Relationship Director for Reebok will take some clients to a baseball game and buy them all drinks. The CMO of United Airlines will give a customer an all-expenses-paid family vacation to anywhere (of their choosing) on the planet. And none of it will be done to drive profit. It will be done because it's the right thing to do. It's good business and it's good living.

But hey, if no one does anything like this, we'll all be golden! If our competitors keep slipping, and fail to provide value, our jobs will be incredibly easy. Once again, blogs are just tools. They're like ears. And the more ears your company has, the more you'll be able to provide for your customers. Not what you want. Not what you want them to want. But what they want.

In the end, it all comes down to relationships. If you can develop meaningful, rewarding relationships with your customers (heck, let's just call them people) you'll be in great shape. I don't think it's a bad thing if every company has a blog. In fact, it's probably an amazing thing. But blogs are just one element of relationship building. They're a great starting point. In the future, companies will have to expand upon that starting point and continue to deliver value in every way possible.

The question then becomes, Where does that value come from? Internal sources or external?

Valeria, how do see the balance of "providing value" playing out in the future? In other words, how much control can a company really give up? Can it rely on its consumers to create significant value or must it looks inwards for most of the innovation?

To be continued... these are interesting questions, join the conversation and help us build on your ideas.

Comments

[Lewis Green]

Valeria,

Thank you for practicing the interview format. I enjoy these lots and get great information. Ryan's a sharp guy and has smart things to share.

[Ryan Karpeles]

Thanks again for doing this, Valeria. I wish I had added one small point to our discussion...

Looking toward What's Next can be a dangerous game. To be honest, I usually shy away from trying to predict the future. (Just look what happened to Miss Cleo :)

I think we need to be doing, rather than forecasting. Our goal as marketers is to keep moving, keep trying and keep failing.

The people who make a difference in this world are the ones who CREATE the future. They don't sit around wondering what it will be like; they go out and make it how they want it to be.

So that's our challenge. To act. To innovate. To progress. We can't wait on the bench and ponder the outcome of the game. We have to be proactively involved in
changing it.

The worst thing that can happen is to end up looking backward and think, "Why the heck didn't I do that?"

[Toby]

Valeria and Ryan - thanks for the thought provoking conversation. I agree that part, a large part, of a social media/blog initiative is "listening." However, more often than not, blogs don't pull in a lot of comments. That does not mean customers do not find the information valuable or that they don't get a sense of the "people who are the company."

For my 2 cents, one of the important aspects of social media is providing customers (and other stakeholders) with the opportunity to engage in an authentic people-to-people dialogue.

[Ryan Karpeles]

Toby,

That's an awesome point. Blogs have the power to create a community. The conversation isn't just between company and customer. Like you said, it takes place away from the organization, on a human to human level.

And again, the goal here is 100% selfless. We're not listening/conversing for OUR sake, and to make OUR lives we better. It's strictly to help our consumers.

The byproduct of that is better products and better services (which in turn can generate more revenue), but the underlying motive is one of humility and giving.

[Valeria Maltoni]

Lewis -- what I love most about these spontaneous conversations is that they really do move the learning to the next level.

Ryan -- my heart is deeply set on action. The format for these dialogues inspires action just by moving us all into participation.

Toby -- imagine what would happen if on occasion the dialogue were facilitated in a very open format, just like this one. It takes commitment to be engaged to inspire engagement. As Ryan says, the company as host and not as one all and be all on its blog.

[Greg Krauska]

Ryan, Valeria, I believe that innovation is nearly always an externally-focused pursuit. Even if innovation is intended to improve an internal process, there is some "customer" affected. Few firms are able to jump to a new curve by focusing inward.

I agree with you, Ryan, that firms and individuals must act, experiment, iterate. That includes the way they engage with customers, knowing that some customers are eager to jump into the discussion, while others are happy to watch and listen.

[Ryan Karpeles]

"That includes the way they engage with customers, knowing that some customers are eager to jump into the discussion, while others are happy to watch and listen."

This is a very important thing to note, Greg. Participation doesn't always have to include direct customer to firm feedback. It can also take the form of watching and monitoring from a distance.

Listening itself is an active form of engagement. People have to actually seek out the discussion. So while it's tempting to think of the "talkers" as the only participants, it would be a mistake to draw the line there.

So Greg, how can we get direct feedback from the "listeners?" Some of the people simply watching might have the best ideas. Is there a way to tap into their thoughts, or would it be too intrusive to try?

[Joe Raasch]

And what of all this VOC (voice of customer) data collection? Without action, customers may quit sharing their views.

Yet we don't want to let customers run our companies. Many customers are looking for the Right Now product, not necessarily the Right Product. We need to balance the immediacy of customer needs with marketing what they don't know they want yet.

[Greg Krauska]

Ryan, to get feedback from the listeners, give them some good reason for them to invest the time or change behavior. To Joe's point about "action," keep inviting people to the conversation and then tell stories that illustrate how getting involved made a difference. For example, Valeria takes the time to ask a question in nearly every one of her posts and then responds to each and every comment. That demonstrates how she values every contribution to the conversation.

What if a software company told their user group members that their blog discussions not only provided x new ideas for the next version, but that the discussion around the suggestions made the input that much more meaningful for the design engineers and the marketing team.

Bottom line: lots of experiments and lots of stories!

[Ryan Karpeles]

Greg, you rock :) I was just testing you, of course...

I think a lot of it, like you said, is just being honest, open, and telling stories. People like interacting with people. The more human you can be, and the more you can reach out, the more people will want to join.

If they know their ideas will make a difference in their own lives (because the company listens and implements them), they'll have every reason to chip in.

Thanks for the valuable feedback.

[Valeria Maltoni]

Joe -- you have a great point there. Think about how we behave as customers, too. When we're looking for something, we *are* in Right Now mode and there is a very narrow window to get our attention. It is possible to do. I wonder if it is by affiliate and soft sell (e.g., product review, recommendation from someone, etc.) mostly.

Greg -- thank you, conversations are an art. The secret is to remember where you left off and flow with it once people are ready to come back to you. How many use this skill in their sales process? I'm not talking about CRM, I'm talking about actually recalling someone's preference, ideas, stories, and building on those.

Ryan -- good of you to be on top of this discussion. I'm really impressed! I think Greg is talking about follow-through, which goes hand in hand with feedback. And making a difference or getting the message that you do is the holy grail of connecting.