Why your customer strategy must focus on social thinking and not social techno

This is not a go do post. It’s a go and think about it post. Here are three Ted Talks I originally saw on Mashable and convey an important message for your customer strategy and how you create earned media:

It is how we socialise and not technology that we need to focus on.

What makes us human is the ability to reason, to think. Information and knowledge is the raw material of this process.

The internet makes this available in abundance. It has empowered individuals like never before. We have moved from passive consumers of information to become active producers of knowledge. Just think Wikipedia and Google’s quest to bring you the most relevant, high quality information it can and how you go about your customer strategy.

  • Clay Shirkey argues that information is now created on mass, is ubiquitous, cheap and global. Citizens are real time journalists that have social power and the real connections are between individuals rather than companies and brands.
  • Stefana Broadben argues that the internet has made us more personal and that we can now become more connected.
  • Seth Godin argues in his presentation below that one person with an idea and enough passion can change the world, can create a movement. It’s the tribe that matters now.

And given that the internet is becoming more mobile, more device agnostic and more accessible, this will have greater implications for how we live – and how you set up your customer strategy in the future. Something to think about :) .

You can find the original article on Mashable.

How To Avoid Building A Better, But Useless, Mousetrap.

If there is perceived value, a customer will buy. And pricing is a question a question of perceived value, where it should be based on value created. This is about getting your customer strategy right.

This can be defined in many different ways. This is best highlighted in the pricing / value pyramid, which is reflected in how well you have created you brand positioning through your brand strategy.

Pricing is about balancing value created and value perceived

You can create value till the cows come home but if you are building a bigger mouse trap that over specs, you have wasted your time. This is about your customer strategy and managing value and managing your bottom line. So many businesses’ have the potential to go out of business or have to high a cost because they have:

  • Started off trying to be different and over generating value that is not relevant. In other words, a nice to have, but not a critical defining customer-driven value factor.
  • Or historically created value that was relevant at the time but is no longer relevant and is no effectively over producing value at a cost with no return.

This point is a critical principle in the strategic book: “Blue Ocean Strategies”.

The value / price pyramid

As a principle to guide your pricing strategy you need to look at the value / price pyramid and determine where you want to sit.

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