The New Brand Tree: Growing the Fruits of Earned Media

What is the the new Brand Tree?

The new Brand Tree is inspired by nature.

Building a healthy brand is like growing a healthy tree.

Give Brands nothing, but take from them EVERY THING!

Battle: The Great War of Digital Consumerism
Strategy: Use Digital to connect, engage, and destroy brands, one interaction at a time!
Weaponry: Digital media or media enabled by the converging forces of social, mobile, cloud and internet of things
Incumbent: Brand
Challenger: Consumer

Who will win this war - consumers or brands?

Consumers push Brands forward...
If today brands are feeling that customers change loyalties at the flip of a coin, they have absolutely no idea about the Great War that is only beginning to take shape. This War will be started by the Digital Consumer and will inspire the entire consumer base to rise and win the war of consumerism if brands don't act now!

Social media's big push within the enterprise (finally!)

Six years after the term Web 2.0 was defined, it's extremely heartening to know that social media is finally entering the enterprise in a big way with the blessings of Oracle and Salesforce.com!

With Oracle's acquisition of Virtue and Collective Intellect, and Salesforce.com's acquisition of Buddy Media, social media and the new facets of customer engagement and innovation will finally begin to see the light of day within the enterprise in the form of social CRM - a key customer relationship management offering that will plug into social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, etc and provide the missing piece of the 360 degree view of the customer.

Through these acquisitions — and the eye-opening price tags behind them — Oracle and Salesforce.com show that the business world is getting ready for social media. It’s no longer considered a fad, definitely not just hype, and not going away any time soon. Businesses must care about social media because it’s clear that consumers already do. - Forbes

What does this mean for Marketing and IT teams?

Marketing will now be able to centrally create, publish, moderate, manage, measure and report on social marketing campaigns and activities on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Google+.

So suit up, IT... and get ready to shake hands with Marketing and drive the social CRM story forward...  what say?

Digital Pandey: Rise of the underdog from your IT backyard

When Bollywood star - Salman Khan - decided to take on the role of Chulbul Pandey in the blockbuster – Dabangg, little did anyone foresee the impact of social media and customer segmentation in the film industry. While many corporations still stayed resistant to tweet or create a fan page, here was a fantasy hero breaking records with more than 19,000 followers in one day and tweeting his experience live during the shooting of this movie. The positioning of the brand – Chulbul – was strategic, and marketing of ‘Munni Badnam Hui’ was extravagant. Touching the hearts and minds of a target audience, this movie set out to become a lesson for businesses to learn, consume, and act upon.

Can the real Chulbul please stand up? Let's be honest. The PC age, Y2K phase, and Dot com era have come and gone; each of them highlighting the relevance of effectively managing Information Technology (IT) in the business environment. Despite multiple attempts to prove its worth, the IT department in many organizations is still undermined and under-funded. It continues to struggle to change its perception of being merely a support function for the business.

So what is it going to take for IT to prove its worth and come in the limelight? When will companies truly believe in IT as a strategic driver for the business?

Well, the time has come!

Today there is a lot of pressure for IT to innovate in support of their businesses and help drive new product development, increase operational efficiencies, and improve customer satisfaction. Similar to social media, other disruptive trends such as cloud and mobility have also emerged. IT is now on the forefront of business. It seems as if it’s now or never.

While the time to rise and shine has come for IT, the expectations to drive business strategies have also increased dramatically. IT will need to continue to act as a support function for the business. But now with the expectation to drive technology-driven strategic changes in the enterprise, IT seems to officially have an added responsibility of playing the role of Chulbul Pandey in today’s business context.

Here are three ways to Dabangg-ify your IT department to meet new business expectations:

1. Get business-savvy. If IT wants to lead fearlessly, then it will need to develop its business acumen as well as understand the business well. Going forward, IT will increasingly be invited to present their innovation plans at board meetings. Skills such as financial forecasting and budgeting will become imperative to justifying large investments. These new IT investments are bound to face resistance from CFOs if IT is unable to demonstrate their value in a clear and measurable way. IT will need to develop business cases and explain how new technology investments will make the company more profitable and competitive in the marketplace.

2. Effectively align IT with business. IT will not only need to talk business but also closely work with business to understand their goals and effectively apply new technologies to meet their goals. However, in order to work closely work with business, IT leaders will firstly need to build strong relationships with key business stakeholders and patiently listen to their current concerns and future needs. In doing so, IT will be able to become a trusted partner on the journey to innovation.

For instance, it is not uncommon to find companies these days adopting customer centricity as the means to sustainable business growth. As consumers spend increasing proportion of their time connecting and expressing themselves on the internet today, companies are looking for ways to leverage these social behaviors to understand, acquire, and retain their customers across digital channels. These intensive data collection and analysis efforts can only be successful if IT effectively partners with business teams – Marketing, Sales, and Customer Service. IT should not just provide technology services and tools but use the opportunity to effectively apply these consumer-facing platforms and technologies to meet the goals of the business. To ensure effectiveness, reduce risk, and justify cost of a radically new technology investment, a detailed technology assessment (including a proof of concept) should be collaboratively conducted and reviewed with business. Once the project is approved, releases should be incrementally rolled out. To build further credibility for such efforts, tying technology metrics to business metrics is also strongly recommended.


3. Sustain innovation capabilities. Social media, cloud computing, mobility, analytics, and Green IT are some of the emerging zones of technology heroism. This is only the beginning of an age of enterprise innovation. Tomorrow there will be a new wave of technologies and trends coming our way that companies will want to leverage in order to refine their business processes or even redefine their business models. 

To drive the business with IT-enabled innovation, IT leaders will need to embody creative leadership and inspire others to walk the path of innovation. 

They will need to develop the right long term strategy and supporting structure, such as creating a nimble, high performance team of business-savvy IT resources and dedicating time to assessing emerging technologies on a regular basis.

To summarize, if you are a part of the IT department in your organization and are excited about innovation, chances are that there is a Digital Pandey in you. So why not take this opportunity to transform yourself, put measurable value from innovation on the enterprise table, and change the perception for IT in your organization!

Your company's Facebook makeover: A social face with skin deep value

Two years back when I wrote a point of view on the business value of social media and what it could mean for business, I pointed out 4 underlying concepts - social networking, collaboration, broadcasting, and rich user experience. With Facebook becoming a clear leader on the web today] that leverages all these concepts, CEOs, please be advised that "Facebook is not going anywhere!".

Many wise digital marketing experts will tell you that Facebook is NOT a strategy but merely a platform for effective consumer engagement, brand management, and marketing efforts. While this is quite true (technically speaking), Facebook is no more a matter of choice but a necessity for companies today.

CIOs need to seriously take a look at leveraging Facebook as an initiative to enhance consumer engagement and viral outreach. In today's web where the network is your customer, the power of 'Like' and other social plugins must not be underestimated.

Before jumping on to the Facebook bandwagon, it is advisable to first understand your consumers and build your presence around them with a 360 degree marketing strategy that connects both online and offline worlds.

In one way, it actually a good thing that the web is dead! With users spending more time on Facebook than other websites, it makes it easier for CIOs to develop an integrated online strategy. You should nevertheless take a look at your company's online ecosystem more holistically and build the right structure and processes to continuously refine it for sustainable benefits.

Web 2.0 is NOT the new Coke: Understand its value and get your enterprise ready

Can Web 2.0 positively impact business value?

CIOs and CEOs listen up! Web 2.0 is not going anywhere. This is NOT the new Coke that many hope it is. This is the beginning of digital socialism. The sonner IT realizes this, the faster it will be able to truly become a strategic partner of the business. Agreed that it is difficult to measure ROI for Web 2.0 or social media implementations but can you afford to not leverage the underlying concepts and technologies to empower your employees, untap hidden networks, enable better collaboration, and foster innovation?

Business today requires change and Web 2.0 has the potential to positively impact your business. So stop making excuses and just go for it!! And here's why (in business terms) -

Web 2.0 technology	What does it do?	Impact	Value Driver
Wikis	Allow users to contribute and share information available in real-time	Improve corporate/shared service efficiency	Reduce cost of internal business interactions > Lower Operating Margin
Social networks	Decentralize decision-making and let solutions evolve through collaboration	Increase staff productivity	Improve asset productivity > Higher Asset Turns
Mashups	Aggregate online content sources within and outside the enterprise to create new, richer services or situational applications	Increase integration efficiencies	Reduce total cost of integration > Lower Operating Margin
Blogs	Improve the ability to provide instantaneous feedback on products and services	Acquire new customers and retain current customers	Higher volume > Grow revenue
RSS feeds	Subscribe to digital content, such as news feeds, podcasts, or blogs	Improve customer interaction efficiency	Reduce cost of external business interactions > Lower Operating Margin
Web services	Help analyze and make decisions faster by making it possible for different business systems to talk to each other	Improve execution capabilities and increase business adaptability	Improve information utilization à Grow revenue
Rich internet applications	Rich user experience by bringing the interactivity of desktop applications to the web	Retain and grow current customers	Higher volume > Grow revenue

*Note: The table lists one benefit for each Web 2.0 technology in order to demonstrate its business value. The benefit may not necessarily be the most popular application of the technology.

The democratization of supply and consumption may threaten the traditional enterprise, thereby classifying Web 2.0 as a disruptive trend. However, enterprises that leverage the long tail will reap the benefits of open, continuous innovation – a sustainable competitive advantage.

So what will it take? And is your enterprise really, really ready?

As consumers and knowledge workers become more internet savvy and collaborate for information, enterprises should be better prepared to adopt Web 2.0. Today’s mainstream consumers are taking control – wanting to help each other and solve each others’ problems. Not only are consumers demanding intuitive, engaging, and relevant digital experiences, knowledge workers (consumers within the enterprise) are also demanding richer user experiences with customizable business process applications that can talk to each other. Gone are the “green screen” days of the mainframe within the enterprise. The confidence around web based technologies to run the business and the maturity and comfort of the work force using these technologies are compelling drivers for early adoption of Web 2.0.

To fully benefit from Web 2.0 technologies within the enterprise, the enterprise will not just need to be comfortable with web-based technologies, but will also need to adopt the following socially-driven business principles:

• The enterprise leverages the web to diffuse enterprise boundaries, resulting in –

a) less vertical boundaries (flatter organization structures),

b) loose horizontal boundaries (more cross-functional interactions),

c) external boundaries (customer and enterprise interactions), and

d) shrinking geographic (global business units) boundaries

• The enterprise considers open innovation as a key strategic driver to leverage the wisdom of the knowledge worker and needs of the customer for sustainable growth
• The enterprise promotes the culture of collaborating, sharing, and knowledge creation.

Once bitten by the internet revolution, the enterprise will be shy to take advantage of the Web 2.0 trends and welcome it within the enterprise. Also the decentralization of control may cause reluctance in Web 2.0 adoption, however the value created by improving the productivity of the knowledge worker and building customer loyalty far outweigh such risks.

As Web 2.0 revolutionizes innovation with its emergent, unstructured, collaborative approach, this will probably need to be one of the most influential strategic initiatives for web-based innovation within the enterprise. To reap the benefits of Web 2.0, the management needs to create a receptive culture and a common platform for a collaboration infrastructure. Interactions should be guided and not controlled. A transitional, informal rollout of the technologies is recommended more than a formal procedural change. Web 2.0 will definitely need the support from leadership but this [unstructured, let it collaboratively evolve] path to value should not be treated like just any other strategic initiative. This path does actually pledge a truly non-replicable, sustainable competitive advantage for the enterprise.

5 underlying concepts of Web 2.0

2.0 comes from the next generation "you".

As a consumer, you are demanding! These days, you have access to all the information you need to make a good purchasing decision. You demand that the best be offered to you at the lowest possible price. You make large Fortune 500 companies crumble to their knees when you turn your eyes to competitors' products. You are the next generation knowledge worker in the workplace. You are also tomorrow's supplier, distributor, or partner aching for the right tools and techniques to be more effective in the marketplace.

The rapidly growing trends on the internet today are empowering you more than ever before. Some are calling these trends as the next generation of the web or Web 2.0. Simply put, there are basically 5 concepts that you need to be aware of:

1. Social networking (online communities, discussion forums): Large online communities are emerging as like-minded people connect on the web. Examples: LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace, SecondLife.

2. Collaboration (blogs, wikis, social bookmarking): People are voluntarily participating in discussions, contributing ideas, and sharing content of common interest. Examples: Wikipedia, BoingBoing, Dispatx.com, del.icio.us

3. Broadcasting (RSS, podcasting) : Online distribution of audio and visual content to the general masses. Examples: YouTube, iTunes

4. Rich user interfaces (AJAX, Flash, Flex): Web sites are becoming more user friendly. It’s easier to personalize, organize, navigate, and find information quickly. Examples: Flickr, NetFlix, iGoogle

5. Service orientation (Mashups, SaaS, widgets) : Combine two or more online content sources to create new, richer services or situational applications. Examples: HopStop, HousingMaps

Most of what you are seeing on the internet today come from these 5 concepts.

You 2.0

View more OpenOffice presentations from Avi Jhangiani.

If you are seeing something that is not covered under these concepts, or if you have any comments I would encourage you to contribute to this blog. Thanks!