Co-creation the Engine of Enterprise Innovation

The Social Business Case

I started TribalCafe with the idea that we could help businesses change and adopt social media, not just for marketing to their customers, but to transform how they harnessed the power of their people; to create a shift in the way people worked together to innovate.We are still working towards that goal but thought we would share some of our thoughts and learning.

Despite the barriers we can learn from companies that have integrated social ways of collaborating and working such as Zappos. But there are plenty of other evidence. For more case studies and information visit the 2.0 Adoption Council, IBM (in association with MIT Center for Digital Business and the Dachis Group) who have published a series of case studies demonstrating integrated social business.

What we can take out from these case studies is:

• They inspire and provide evidence of what is possible and both in terms of capabilities and results


• Provide ideas, best practice and mistakes that can be shared and that people can reuse


• New thinking on existing similar issues that others may face


• Building blocks - knowledge and experience that others can use and add to

Inspiring insights

What we find today that whilst many businesses have taken their first steps towards using social media for external communications few have strategically aligned themselves towards a  social business. This is despite mounting evidence from reports like McKinsey's Web 2.0 in business results reported in December, 2010. McKinsey's analysis of companies found that “Market share gains reported by respondents were significantly correlated with fully networked and externally networked organisations. This, we believe, is statistically significant evidence that technology-enabled collaboration with external stakeholders helps organisations gain market share from the competition..”

Deloitte has also released a new study on using social software for improved business performance. The social business study has made clear how business leaders of today need to harness social business for the “unique capabilities to address current operating challenges and improve operating metrics”.

So now we are starting to see a picture emerge of a new way of working a new enterprise ecosystem that fosters ideas, builds and supports co-creation processes and then resources some of these to effectively innovate. It is important that organisations effectively set a clear path for taking commercial ideas to fruition; if they do not they will fail to harvest the fruits of encouraging co-creation.

The Relationship Culture

Whether it is friendship, partners or marriage; good relationships involve  reciprocation, good communication, consideration...if organisations want employees to give up ideas, foster collaboration, devote additional energy and hours when needed and advocate the benefits of the business...they need to think of developing a relationship with their people. This moves a business beyond a transactional exchange of money and benefits for goals and objectives to be achieved; it becomes a relationship culture. If knowledge and ideas are the new oil of commerce this becomes a necessity; but transformation needs to be considered, planned and developed in line with the broader organisational strategy it needs shareholder buy-in and the commitment to the long term.


“Culture is to organizations what personality is to people.” Edgar Schein.

Some of the Barriers that Enterprises Face

New Business Models

We are in a era where ideas can be transform industries, where new business models can forged through the combination of imagination and technology. The flexibility and adaptability of technology now invites people to break through traditional models, re-invent how we think of business; and for brands it is flattening the value chain - it is providing direct links to the end customer or consumer.

But many businesses as yet are not digitally literate and do not have an understanding of emerging technology and the possibilities it can offer. There is often a limited understanding of how enterprise social media can strategically benefit the business. Consequently it is hard for those unfamiliar with the tools and approaches of social business to extrapolate ideas to benefits and opportunities. The hardest part about social business is changing your thinking.

Analysis Paralysis

Some businesses are not taking action despite the level of data, market trends, case studies and other relevant supporting information. This analysis paralysis and aversion to change and risk is at a time when markets are moving faster than before - the risk therefore of not taking action is often not considered within this mix.

Meanwhile competitive businesses test, pilot and scale gaining learning, results today. They develop capability and discover how to create value through their people. It is not about prematurely launching some initiative though based on an ill formulated goal. It is about setting a course and strategy that is company wide, building resources and capabilities and incremental change based on strategic projects, shared learning and targeted parts of the business. Sharing knowledge and lessons learned on how a social business.

However,scoping projects, scoring capabilities and objectives, allocating budget and resources are vital to take the first steps

Tools and Technology Blindness

Many organisations are used to large scale deployments of software and systems. Yet the agility of todays technology involves much easier integration, adaptation and scaling. Organisations are facing competing vendor advice, internal positioning of technology needs and as a result get wrapped up in the tools not the business objectives. They get caught in the what can't be done rather than what is the idea and how can it be achieved.

It is important to establish a social business strategy that considers social business behaviours and supports the adoption of technologies that create a continuous flow of knowledge, information and value exchange. Enterprises cannot build a social business culture on tools and technologies alone.

Organisation Structure and Responsibilities

A social business has many facets and touches upon the core disciplines within the business. Executives are used to formalized structures and responsibilities, yet social business transcends this. HR, Marketing, Customer Service, Internal Communications, PR or IT are all affected. There is the obvious need to create a new position for this yet in the initial stages it needs to be carefully chaired and guided by a group to ensure consistency in the development of the process.

Co-creation the Engine of Enterprise Innovation

What does the social business look like:

Flexibility: people will have a more fluid role based on a far greater demand for project based work; where people are more identifiable as facilitators, specific experts or technicians, project managers...

Adaptable: Cost of fuel is increasingly making home working more effective, locality will increasingly become important and hours will be determined by a work life balance. Multiple projects become the basis for tuning hours vs. pay and benefits

Skills and Learning: If the pace of change is increasing then aligning skills to market needs will be enhance value both for the individual and the organisation. More businesses will attract and work with people to develop their skills - even contracted partners.

Open and transparent: Management practices will be transparent (mindful of course of peoples confidentiality). The familiar 360 process will extended to partners and customers but rather than staged annually it will be more dynamic.

Brand and Service: The brand, the culture and the people will increasing become intertwined affecting talent acquisition, customer perceptions and value proposition.

Cisco uses a social business strategy to improve brand positioning and create awareness, but the process of doing this has driven an output internal Enterprise 2.0 efficiency and a new social business culture. Co-creating value should not not only be through internal people; it is needs to be part of a broader market community where customers are included and opportunities to harness and shape new value models. The prize is available to those that start the journey.

I have only touched upon some aspects of social business and would welcome other ideas, experiences, case studies and examples.

 

 

 

Is Social Media the working mum's life line?

Being a Parent
Firstly, let me introduce myself, I am 35, married and mother to a daughter (9) and son (6) like all parents I will describe my children as being extremely wonderful and special human beings and whilst this is true all the other parents among you will know that this is not the whole story.

So, wanting to be the best parent I could be, I made the decision that my working life needed to be adaptable and give me the ‘work life balance’ that would enable me to live this Brady Bunch style existence. In this vein I decided that working for myself was really the only option. I am now 8 years down the line, I have established and sold two successful businesses and I now have some experience that I wish I had had way back then.

Lessons Learnt

In an attempt to use this experience in my next venture, define what it is that I have learnt over the years and maybe see others benefit from this I thought a blog would a way forward.

There is no denying the fact that being a working mum is a real challenge and no disrespect to the fathers out there but it seems that paid work for a mother is an addition to all the other roles they play and not their primary role so finding time for it is somewhat difficult.

So first things first and one of the biggest mistakes I made, was understanding the difficulty of getting a new business off the ground. When you first get started it is so easy to get bogged down with the stuff you feel confident in, for many people that I have come across this is often:

• doing what they are good at, their skill (not looking at how to sell/market their business)


• talking to just clients they know well


• producing business plans that reflect their view; rather than some customer research


• working on their service; instead of marketing, networking and selling

So in all of this it is easy to forget some of simple, basic but  important aspects of establishing a start up.

What is often neglected is the face to face interactions that will put the personality behind your brand and use this to make yourself memorable. People buy from people, see the (AC Nielsen Report), so whatever you product or service it is important that your customers have a feel for who you are and what you are about.

With the rise in social media you can network, arrange meetings and cover a lot of ground before meeting people as well as give people an idea of who you are. It is becoming easier and quicker to build relationships, it is also a working mothers dream.

I am only touching the basics here and pointing out the opportunities so here are a few good tips to get you going. It is important to develop your confidence. Choose 1 platform, research and learn how to use it well; perhaps use 1 for a week and then move onto another. Find out from speaking to potential customers what they recommend, it starts a conversation! and you ideally want to use the same platforms that they use.

Some Introductory Guides

A starting point for Face Book:

• Six questions to ask before launching a Facebook fan page


• 10 Secrets of a Winning Facebook Fan Page

A starting point for Twitter:

• Keep It Short and Tweet: Intro to Microblogging Using Twitter


• So what the hell is Twitter anyway?

A starting point for Linkedin:

• An introduction social media (slides with Linkedin tips near end)

The use of social media platforms to give your business a personality and get people talking about it is manageable from home and is not restricted to office hours, it allows us working parents to blog, tweet and post around the kids social lives, I say kids social lives because I clearly no longer have one of my own!

So for all out there who aspire to run their own business’s, get into social media this could be the opportunity for you to get the building blocks in place. You will still be able to take the kids to school and pick them up, attend all their clubs and school events and ferry them around to the never ending stream of parties. Don’t forget that all social media platforms can be managed from smart phones so just think next time your sat watching your children run riot at the park you could be building your business profile.

Let me know some of the challenges you face with the 'work life balance' myth.

Next week I will be taking you through how to use some of these tools in more depth, look forward to connecting with you.

Alison

Social Business and Strategy Thoughts

What is a Social Business Strategy?

A strategy is quite simply it is the long term plan on what to do to achieve a goal.

A good strategy defines a very clear route on what an organisation is looking to achieve and answers the question on how it will do this. A social business strategy then is focused on how an organisation is to integrate social technologies to help it achieve its goals. There are two areas of opportunity for an organisation; to improve performance and productivity internally and to improve customer engagement externally.

To make some decisions then about a social business strategy organisations have to think about how the context of these within their business and the fit to their customers. Before deploying resources (people, money...) some key questions need to be answered...e.g.  how will these technologies affect our business model, what new models will evolve...

How do we develop a social business strategy?

If you understand your business goals then aligning a social business strategy to your goals becomes easier. For most organisations the primary need is to effectively integrate social technologies into marketing to their customers. But targeting how you are going to do this requires some research. Why? well there are a host of reasons here are a few:

• You need to differentiate your product/service and have a unique proposition/strategy compared to your competitors


• Because the more you understand your customers the better chance you have of finding unique ways to interact with them, engage them and add value to your communication.
  
  
  
  • The aim is to understand who your customers are, where they are and what they are interested in, what problems they face, what behaviours they exhibit, what they think about your type of products/services...
  
  
  
  


• The best marketing insights come from research and then provide unique ways for genuine customer engagement


• If you know your market better than your competition chances are you will have a competitive edge; be able to change faster and adapt.


• If you understand your current position ve. competitive brand you will have a benchmark point from which to improve and understand how to set a strategy tht creates a tangible point of difference.

Where to start?

This all depends on the size of your oganisation, structure, culture...but an initial opportunity is to identify what is being said about your brand/business/product or service on the network. Many tools exist from simlple to more complex.



Our Blog on Social Media Monioring Tools covers many of the main free and paid for tools that you might use. But in order to start with you need to set yourself some objectives for what you are going to listena for and research.

• Define an Objective


• Decide where to monitor


• Decide what to monitor


• Match your requirements to the right technology (social monitoring tool)

The online landscape is saturated with more than 200 tools and platforms claiming to be able to help you track and assess mentions of your business or brand in social media channels. While there remains a lot of churn in the field, a number of listening platforms have evolved to help you go beyond basic monitoring into an integrated approach that helps inform multiple parts of your business: product development, customer support, public outreach, lead generation, market research and campaign measurement.



Many organisations have now got beyond the question of the need to apply social technologies and now need to answer the questions of how to integrate these. In moving to a social business they recognise that they do not have the skills. Importantly the questions that they need to strategically answer and the research needed sit outside their scope and so they need to partner with an agency.

For others that have already tested solutions scale and integration become critical; but scale often means setting a strategy to migrate from legacy systems. However, the strategy needs to be set for initially integrating solutions into CRM, marketing and sales solutions for marketing, customer service and sales.

Some of the challenges facing organisations today are how to :

• Integrate solutions in the enterprise space for CRM


• Building internal capabilities and teams (training, education and recruitment)


• Work across divisions and departments to develop projects - traditionally it is marketing that has led social media strategy but now internal communications, PR, customer service... need to be involved.


• Develop business model/stakeholder by-in and ROI


• Develop clear marketing strategy including integration into website - see below (click to enlarge).

What do you think the big challenges are now?

How well are organisations researching and setting their strategies?

If I was a Writer...how would I use social media?

How is the market changing?

Historically publishers determined the careers of many authors, they were the gatekeepers to getting a book into print; despite publishers turning down their work some writers were successful. But for the majority of writers getting into print was an elusive dream.

However, whilst publishers still wield large amounts of power, their control has diminshed. Writers can self-publish, sell directly and have a direct relationship with their followers.

People write for different reasons. For many it is the process of being creative that is important, the ability to express thoughts, emotions and make human connections. Writers develop our learning both culturally and personally as well as provoke debate and thoughts; we can now share these stories as never before.

There are 3 main changes that have taken place in the market:

1. The move to digital - like the music industry the transition to digital is changing the business model that has existed for decades.
   
   
   
   1. Amazon reporting that it now sells more ebooks than Hardback books.
   
   
   2. The advent of ebook readers has accelerated this change e.g. Kindle and the Nook (Barnes and Noble). Barnes and Noble sold over 1M books on Xmas day 2010 a story repeated by Kindle books.
   
   
   3. Although a small base ebook sales are set to grow massively from 1$Bn in 2010 to 3$Bn in 2015 as forecast by Forrester.
   
   
   
   


2. The development of social media - enabling writers to market their books themselves, build relationships and develop a community of followers.


3. The development of online tools - creating tools to facilitate the writing process and help in self-publishing a book

How does this affect an author?

Writing is in itself a difficult process requiring a number of creative and organisational skills. However, to succeed in this highly competitive market an author today needs to sharpen their business skills. Publishing Perspectives tidily sums up the need for modern authors to be entrepreneurs.

This shift is reflective of the costs and returns that authors can expect to gain from their labour. An article by Tim Ferris sums up some of the main figures and obstacles to success. A more detailed set of figures and analysis of how to market a book (click here to download) is illustrated by Jonathan Fields at his great site Tribal Author.

Where to start - Learn and Explore?

Many people are only just seizing the opportunity to write, but they are starting at a time when resources and information are easily available via the internet. There are lots of communities and sites that provide guidance, advice and allow people to network. The task of writing of writing a book, though daunting, can now be moderated by a broad community of fellow writers and the wealth of experience that they openly share.

Writing Communities - Critique, Networking and Resources

• www.writing.com - a website and community to share your work and review others


• www.authonomy.com - critique others work, meet people and chat, publish your own work. Top 10 pieces of work are reviewed by Harpers Collins editors


• www.scribophile.com - review other people's work and earn points which then allow you to publish your own work


• www.inkpop.com - A younger writers site with review and publishing capabilities


• www.writersbeat.com - a community site covering many genres as well as poetry and songs


• www.nothingbinding.com - publish your work, review others and also provides tips and resources for writers


• www.reviewfuse.com - a writing group for authors who want to improve their work


• www.offthebookshelf.com - a community of authors, publishers and readers. Work can be published and reviewed.


• www.nanowrimo.org - The National Novel Writing Month (November)


• www.bookrix.com - a community that connects writers and readers. You can download free ebooks as well as enter free writing contests

Some online writing and publishing tools

• Blurb - lurb is one of the most popular online publishers. Blurb lets you design your book by adding photos, artwork, and text


• Lulu - Lulu eliminates traditional entry barriers to publishing, and enables authors to bring their work directly to their audience. They take advantage of Lulu’s dedicated marketplace to make their published work available.


• iUniverse - iUniverse offers full editorial support to its authors, and provides editorial, marketing and self-publishing services authors would expect from a traditional publisher.


• Xlibris - Xlibris is oriented more towards traditional books, not picture books.


• WordClay - WordClay is ideal for authors who are on a tight budget. Wordclay offers three different paperback formats, and they do only black and white prints.


• AuthorHouse - AuthorHouse provides a broad array of tools and services to allow authors to make their own choices throughout the publishing process.


• WeBook - WEbook claims to be the largest online writing community in the world and an innovative book publisher. You can start a project or collaborate with others on their projects.


• Protagonize - a creative writing community dedicated to writing various forms of collaborative, interactive fiction.

Here is a great reminder of the importance of the creative process from Amy Tan.



If I was an Author...

Over 500,000 books are published every year (200,000 through traditional print and 300,000 through a combination of self-published, print on demand “POD” and electronic books). The average mainstream published book sells a about 2,000 copies. And, though estimates vary widely, most self-published and POD books sell from a few copies to a few hundred.

To be different and stand out you need to have a clear strategy, a keen focus on your audience and the tenacity to consistently use creative techniques to build and market yourself.

• Listen and Learn
  
  
  
  • Review some of the authors and look up what they are doing on social media - Facebook, Twitter and their own website. Here is a list of authors that use Facebook.
  
  
  • Use experts such as Joanna Penn who has lots of useful advice and plenty of resources on her site Creative Penn.
  
  
  
  


• Develop a blog
  
  
  
  • Identify what message and value readers would gain from visiting my blog. I could focus on a specific niche sector and then write about books, authors, events, provide tips and resources for others.
  
  
  • Blog tools - Tumblr, Squidoo, Wordpress and include an RSS feed on your blog.
  
  
  • List on the blog places where my book can be purchased
  
  
  
  


• Identify influencers and build relationships:
  
  
  
  • These might be  people in a specific industry or authors that are reasonably well established (be realistic) in social media and have reasonable number of followers. Make contact and explore opportunities.
  
  
  • Form a collaborative set of friends who you can help and who can help you. It pays dividends to be able to help promote each other as well as get feedback on ideas.
  
  
  • Offer to write guest blogs on sites - find blogs that fit to your target audience and bloggers who are recepetive to this (ask and you might be surpised). Use Technorati, Blogsearch or Alltop.
  
  
  
  


• Use Video to build your story
  
  
  
  • People like Gary Vaynerchuk used YouTube to engage an audience in his passion which is wine. Passions and writing go hand in hand and so if I was writing a non-fiction book I would use YouTube to talk about my passion, offer advice, develop conversations and help people.
  
  
  • For fiction I would build the story of my experiences and explain a bit about my thoughts, heroes and break through moments. An authors own story often attracts as much attention as their books.
  
  
  • Develop a trailer for a book a 3 min film providing the excitement and tension that will provoke readers curiousity - see Crystal Booths blog on Squidoo
  
  
  
  


• Twitter
  
  
  
  • register my name on Twitter and link to my blog and Facebook account. Tweet about things that interesting ideas and people, tips and trends and links to key market information e.g. who is topping the book chart in my sector, key publisher news...and of course a book if near to release
  
  
  
  


• Facebook
  
  
  
  • Develop a professional Facebook page that is interactive, provides useful information and creates an experience. An example might be to have an interactive set of questions about a few main characters in a book which enables people to explore more and involve them in the book.
  
  
  • Sell my book(s) directly within Facebook - note 1 page per book; (see TribalCafe blog on Social Commerce).
  
  
  • Provide chapter releases prior to launch of a new book (free for download or free to view and read) on the Facebook page in return for a like.
  
  
  • Use the events page to promote any signing tours or events I had planned
  
  
  • Use a page to offer a number of free signed book copies to followers
  
  
  • Occasionally ask followers to review books on Amazon/other sites
  
  
  
  


• PR
  
  
  
  • Radio - get in touch with local radio networks and promote your book/do an interview. Use Twitter and linkedin to promote it.
  
  
  • Webinar - hold an online webinar with some other authors and invite followers to ask questions before hand via Twitter - pick out some common questions and discuss/chat with guests
  
  
  • Magazines/Newspapers - get in touch with local/national magazines that are relevant and send in an article.
  
  
  
  


• Be responsive
  
  
  
  
  • Always respond promptly to your followers and critics (be polite) and listen to feedback.
  
  
  • Join in the communities that are a good fit and participate in the discussions - meeting new people and learning are all part of the process
  
  
  
  

What does the future hold?

There are many that think that publishers will lose power to authors establish direct relationships with their community of followers through social networks. However with so much content continually being produced there is a growing demand for aggregated, filtered and edited work; because we value the time it takes to sift and search to find quality.


New forms of publishers will emerge based on niche markets and these may be able to facilitate and compete more effectively than larger publishing houses in specialist markets. They could create followers based on their specialism as well as attract authors and subsequently create offline events for authors and followers.


Inevitably technology, which is increasingly becoming richer with video and interactive digital formats, will lead to new types of books that link back to social networks, websites, adverts and video/other media. This will create new sets of experiences and new opportunities to monetise a book.

Here is a list of some writing tips from writers to writers by Marelisa.


What do you think the future holds for authors?

How would you use social media for your work?