Markets are Conversations

Cluetrain Manifesto got me thinking a lot about consumers—consumers of all types, of material goods, of information, of services.  It had me thinking about consumers’ actions…our attitudes, our consumption, our expectations, and our voices.  Cluetrain suggests that markets are conversations; a two-way interaction between businesses and their customers.  Businesses no longer enjoy the luxury of conducting “business as usual”—going out there to make the quickest buck, regardless of how the consumer feels. 

A Nation of K’fetchers:

“Oy, I just got back from the car wash, and I’ll tell ya, they gypped me! They completely missed that spot next to my rear-view mirror…and they charged me up the….well, Lisa Marie across the street said that she had her car washed for $5 less and hers came out so much nicer…I’m going to call Marcy and tell her to go to Lisa Marie’s place next time…” Okay, so maybe this is a bit dramatized, but tell me you haven’t heard some variation of this monologue before. But now instead of calling Marcy, mom or dad is taking the web and airing the grievances for the entire block, scratch that, the entire world to hear!  If enough people catch wind of your mom’s complaint…well hot damn, that more expensive car wash could very well be forced to change its practices, less lose all its customers!

The internet has become an platform on which indignant customers can really ream into the businesses that have done them wrong!  True the k’fetching stems from a discontent that in many ways is warranted.  So here’s a little history of why we’re so aggrieved with the way our markets work today.  Cluetrain touches on the business trend towards mass markets.  The emphasis on “Mo’ Bigga Mo’ Betta” economies of scale focused businesses attention away from consumer needs and fixed it on how to run the most efficient business.  This often means sacrificing unique services or products in order to offer homogenized—but cheap—goods on a large scale.  We successfully McDonaldized business. 

The bigger and more efficient the businesses became, the less accessible influential and upper management became.  Have a problem with your TV provider?: Please hold and someone may be with you at his or her earliest convenience to “assist” you.  How I envy the days of mom-and-pop stores, local markets, and quaint bookstores where everyone knows your name and what book you’ll enjoy best!  Today, it is too often that we see homegrown retailers being squashed out by retail conglomerates.  While the large retail operations may be economically pragmatic, they often lose track of their purpose—providing a service for their customers.   

       

“They can have it in whatever color they’d like, as long as it’s black”

People want to feel like their needs are being heard and met.  Customer service folks!  Sure, it was easy for Henry Ford to tell people to take it or leave it…he was offering the only product out there.  But now, we expect more because there is are more options. We expect to find exactly what we want, when we want, in our size and that color that compliments our complexion oh so perfectly. 

“They can have it in whatever color they’d like, as long as it’s black”…these days are long gone! We now have cars (and g-d knows a million other goods) in every size, shape, and color to meet our every need.  You’re a soccer mom carting around 5 kids; here is a lovely black minivan for you.  You’re a 55 year old newly divorced man going through a midlife crisis, have your pick of any flashy red two door sports car—don’t forget the turbo engine and swanky beige leather interior.  So this is evidence that markets hear consumers’ demands, and adapt to meet their every need, right? Well…sorta…

The internet is a powerful tool and is absolutely forcing businesses to listen their customers in a way Henry Ford would never have thought possible!  We as consumers have the opportunity to have our concerns be heard, and our needs be met…because we have a voice—an unadulterated voice through which we can express our REAL thoughts and opinions about their products.  Customers are angry…they’ve had to deal with automated voice messaging systems that are a poor excuse for customer service for far too long!     

           

Remember that carwash that risked a major PR disaster due to mom’s little hissy fit gone viral?  Well not to worry, the owner of the car wash responded to her tweet PERSONALLY, and offered her and all of her friends complimentary detail services the next time they stop by!  Now that’s a conversation.  Perhaps Laura Mercier doesn’t make an eye shadow in the purple that really makes your green eyes ‘pop’…so you write about this on your makeup blog, and other green-eyed makeup aficionados agree, Laura is missing the critical color in her collection.   Well, Laura’s people catch wind of this and poof—the next line features that exact purple you were looking for!  What a win…companies no longer have to guess what their customers are looking for...because they’re telling them in conversations across the web!  And boom: just like that customers can now get exactly what they’re looking for out of the companies they love.   

Great! So, no need for an American black out, you can now wear self-expression on your proverbial, and literal, sleeve—a great victory for non-conformist everywhere!  So why are we still complaining?  They didn’t get my car to me fast enough…the color looks washed out…I’m always a size 24, this company makes shitty jeans if I can’t fit into their 24…the laundry list of complaints goes on and on and on.  The Internet has given consumers a voice to hold conversations with businesses that resembles an era of mom-and-pop local markets…because it gives a place to vent and receive feedback, and ultimately to get what we are looking for out of our purchasing experience.  But unlike complaining at a mom and pops store, our interaction isn’t face-to-face. I’d venture a guess that people wouldn’t complain about ¼ of what they k’fetch about online if they were doing so in person.  That faceless/lack of a person to report to—consumers’ biggest complaint with respect to customer service—has in some way emboldened and empowered us to continue complaining.  Watch out big business, the consumers are in control!

Diving into Web 2.0--Dan Gillmor

For some people, thoughts of oceans illicit fond memories and relaxing feelings.  The ocean is a source of relaxation, food, and renewal.  It cleanses impurities, nourishes the bodies, and enriches life. The sound of breaking waves plays as background music, washing away concerns and connecting individuals enjoying the same resonance.  The ocean is a commons to which everyone has access—in an ocean anyone (theoretically) is free to swim, engage in recreational activities for entertainment, gather food to satiate them, and establish businesses to provide livelihood.  For these people the ocean feels infinite and represents the ultimate freedom. 

For others, the ocean invokes horror; a vast, dark body consuming a majority of the earth’s surface.  It is filled with creature and topographies we cannot begin to fathom. The water ebbs and flows as it pleases taking no prisoners, but making victims of those who stand in its way.  It is filled with unfamiliar creatures looming in dark crevasses, and hungry predators waiting, lurking, and stalking their prey. True understandings of the complex systems flourishing in the darkest depths of the ocean are limited to few experts.  The ocean, for these people, does not represent ultimate freedom, but rather ultimate chaos.  No rules, no regulations, just boundless anarchy and threats.

Gillmor suggests that “information is an ocean, and newsmakers can no longer control the tide as easily as they once did” (45).  Information as an Ocean: what a terrifying and exhilarating concept.  What imagery comes to mind when you envision an ocean of information?  Is it placid and bountiful—ideas and facts swirling gingerly around each other, available to be shared with anyone who cares to find them; to provide us with “food for thought “and entertainment, and to nourish our souls?  Or is the ocean you envision a more savage body; a brutish ocean of uncontrollable tides, clashing against each other with conflicting theories and false information—creating an unsafe environment?  The idea of an information ocean brought up both images for me, and shaped the way approached Dan Gillmors’s We The Media.   Like the robust ocean, information is a powerful force.  It is expansive and understanding of much of it is confined to the minds of few—or so it has been the case historically. Behold now: the Web.         

Traditional media was limited in its scope, and as Gillmor asserts, a very controlled environment.  That is to say the information that was disseminated as “news” was determined by gatekeepers at the top of media’s hierarchy. These gatekeepers decided which stories were relevant and deserving of airtime, and which stories would hit the cutting room floor—never to be known by the general public.  The media controlled the flow of information, omitting details they didn’t want leaked and sensationalizing stories they wanted to promote.  The media was charged as the watch-dogs of government and was responsible for providing information for people to make informed decisions on what to do—but who were watching the media to make sure the information they were providing was valid and the full picture?        

Welcome to Web 2.0—an interactive cyber ecosystem that in many ways mimics our own complex physical world.  Information is plentiful and now available in every flavor, color, and size you can think of in real time!  The internet has become a channel for information…and not just for receiving it, but also for sharing it.  This is where the “read-write web,” as Gillmor terms it, comes into play.  The Web was designed to be writeable, not just readable.  The internet has become a conversation and everyone is trying to get their voice heard!  News is no longer limited to what Mr. Big up at Media Oligarchy’s headquarters says it is….news is much bigger, much broader…it’s ours.  News is now what we deem important!  Information is readily available for those who want to take it!

The media hierarchy has become obsolete, and anyone with internet access can contribute to this open source journalism.  Information is gushing through web streams—and that’s great!  Anyone can add information through a wiki, spread knowledge to a target audience through mail lists, and share with the world on a blog.  People can solicit the internet for entertainment, and even establish VERY lucrative businesses.  The internet is like the ocean, with limited barriers to access it and information flowing throughout: it is the ultimate in freedom!

But how do we sift through the noise to find what is legitimate?  Who are the experts?  Who is telling the truth and who is spreading libel? Journalists are held to legal and professional standards, and thus we trust what they publish is honest (and if it isn’t, they’ll surely correct themselves—well, ideally that is the case).  This new breed of citizen journalist that Gillmor describes, have no such legal structures that monitor the veracity of the content they share on the web.  In this sense the information ocean can be quite scary!  When information gets out on the internet it flows in full force, reaching around the world in the time it takes a person to log onto the net…quite the force to be reckoned with.   

We have more information available at the click of button than we could ever process over the course of a lifetime.  We have the potential to use this resource to feed our minds and enrich of lives.  However, we are pioneering a Wild West, if you will, and we must remain vigilant.  We no longer can control what information is going to leak, and you better belief that once it does the leak is damn near impossible to plug!  People can promulgate information that “goes viral” in order to promote a cause that can be entirely false!  Such false information is dangerous and often hard to identify.  While there is more information out there, we must actively engage and participate in searching for the truth.

The information ocean gushes through the internet.  We may engage with it at whatever rate we desire.  We can choose to look at the internet as scary and dark, or we can approach it as a resource that can be used to enrich our lives.  The free flow of information is critical.  Thanks to technology and the web people are engaging in dialogues about shared interests around the world.  The multi-national insight is invaluable to expanding our horizons, knowledge, and understanding of the news.  But we cannot tread lightly.  We must be vigilant watch-dogs, or lifeguards in this tumultuous information ocean.  We must resuscitate stories that are drowning in the wake of lies.  The days of the media spoon feeding us information the way they want us to process it are long over…while this is liberating in many ways, it also leaves us with a great deal of responsibility.  We are no longer passive consumers; we are active participants thanks to the web 2.0.