Social manifesto - How companies are using social media. Part 3 of 4

#3 Listen for new insights

Imagine if you could get the very best development or marketing ideas you’d never thought of from people who actually use your product? 

This is the killer “listening” app of the social Web. It works lots of ways:

• Finding conversations that are already happening and pulling ideas from them
• Creating opportunities for vast communities to offer and edit their own ideas 
• Using captive marketing groups to deeply understand human behavior and test new concepts and products.

Pros:

• Connects you to the best ideas inside your own company and in your larger community
• Often very cost effective, leveraging resources you already have

Cons:

• Can generate overwhelming amounts of content
• Can take your brand in inauthentic directions. Need to make sure you balance what the market wants with what’s true to who you are or what your product does

Make sure you:

• Have a very savvy filter for the input. Either by letting the community vote OR by finding someone who can translate ideas into insights

An example: Bell Canada
The CEO of Bell Canada believes in getting feedback from the frontlines.

It started as small meetings, one-on-one interactions. But, that quickly became unscalable, particularly as employees came to the table with more and more ideas.

To bridge the gap, Bell Canada created a suggestion / ideas system internally. Any employee can submit an idea. And, all employees are encouraged to logon and evaluate ideas.

Those that get the best community feedback are taken directly to the executive team.

Comments

[Steffan Postaer]

Very astute observations, Advergirl.
Enjoyed and learned,
Steffan

[Danielle]

Cool set up! I love your blog.

Its weird, the whole social media thing is so ridiculously strong right now! When will this boom go bust like the housing market did?

[Allan]

This one of your three manifestos thus far is the one I believe is the most important. Building a community is going to be on the top of everyones list. Its such an obvious task that everyone will try to do it and customers will grow wary of most companies community building efforts. Activating ambassadors assumes that there will be quality evangelists that could lend authenticity and credibility to your message. I think the supply of influential people who could perform admirably as ambassadors will grow thin. So this one isnt going to be the fault of the corporation but rather the age old problem of talent scarcity.

Listening well however is something that every corporation can exercise discipline and creativity to. If companies can learn to utilize social media as a way for them to strengthen the feedback loop, I think theyll derive greatest benefits.