Seven years ago, Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger posted an online document called the Cluetrain Manifesto. It laid out 95 principles for communicating with customers online. The Manifesto created big stir, was signed by a lot of people working in the tech industry, and turned into a book that sold well at the height of the Internet bubble. But since then it has been largely forgotten.
Seven years later, the Manifesto is a mixed bag. Some of its maxims are seriously out of date, and a few are just plain wrong. There are also some things missing. Because the document is long, and parts of it are badly off target, we’re reluctant to refer any of our clients to it today.
However, parts of the Manifesto are just plain brilliant, and deserve to be spray-painted on the walls of corporations around the world.
Tag Archives | Marketing
Marketing is the way we tell our story so it’s relevant to real people in their real lives. Telling our story is more than branding and logos but how the price, the value proposition, the routes to market and all that tie together as part of a whole.
Understanding the full impact of the web
This will probably sound crazy, but despite all the hype about Web 2.0 and web startups, the most common mistake we see tech companies making with regard to the web is underestimating its long-term impact on their businesses.
I’m not sure why this is. Maybe it’s a reaction to the Internet bubble — because the short-term effects of the web were oversold, people also tuned out the long-term effects. I know some companies are so settled in their current franchises that they don’t understand how vulnerable they are over time to the changes taking place in the marketplace. Others take the web very seriously in one respect, but don’t understand its full impact across their entire company.
To understand what the web is going to do to our businesses, you have to look at it as both an application development platform and a new communication medium. Either change alone would have huge impacts, but the two together are especially powerful. Here’s what we see happening in each area, followed by some ideas on what they mean for businesses.
Give Me That Thing Called Love
Do your customers look at your products with the same eager anticipation as they once did? Have your customers stayed “married” to you? Would you consider them still in love—or waiting it out until someone better comes along?
Don’t Be the Dinosaur Brought Down by Mosquitoes
We work in Silicon Valley… and there are a few hundred new acronyms and technologies introduced each year that we need to understand. Being a trusted advisor means that clients need us to be really smart, on top of the latest trends, and interpreting what really matters so we can engage with them to design new, winning business strategies.
Multiplier Developer Ecosystems
In grade school, one of the key determinants of popularity on the playground was how quickly you were selected when the time came to choose up sides for basketball, baseball or soccer. In the same way, the developing business model for the next ten years depends hugely on which set of developer and ecosystem partners pick you.
However, unlike grade school, you might have more ability to influence this selection.
Go-to-market Mix in the Web 2.0 Era
It’s been 40+ years since E. Jerome McCarthy published Basic Marketing, the business book that introduced the “4 Ps” (product, price, place/distribution and promotion) to the world. While the categories still hold true, what was once considered the leading edge has drastically evolved. Web 2.0 has also impacted the paradigm by changing what product definitions look like, and how things that are sold as ‘free’ can make money. So while the 4 Ps are a good start as buckets, let’s update them for today’s era and discuss what you need to be doing to keep your mix both relevant and impactful.
Here’s my take on what’s happening… and some ideas on what you need to do to win your market.
Blue Plate Special, a la Carte, or All You Can Eat
Do you remember a time when most meals were the sit down, full-service, dessert-included kind? Even if all you wanted was a cup of soup or a simple salad, you were offered the blue plate special with everything at one price. Then the culinary folks came up with small plates, a la carte items, tastings, pairing menus, buffets and the like. Whew! Choices–who knew!
Stepping up to the Microphone
Can you imagine what it would be like to charge 20-200% more than your competitor and own market category dominance? This final part of the Bootcamp series focuses on ways your organization can increase its economic power.
Success isn’t an equation that looks like this:
Great Product + Advertising + Price Point + Distribution = Success
Consumer technology matters but only to a few…
Consumer technology matters, sure. But remember that most of consumer technology stuff is something people made up and then found someone willing to buy. I profess to have done this with web authoring software, and countless other tools. Consumer marketing is demand-creation focused. No one ever thought they needed a treo until they had one. [...]
Out With the Old Process, In With the New – Completely
Remember Webvan? Those pretty brown trucks. We saw one all scuffed up and worn down by the side of the road today and it perfectly symbolized the promise of an Internet-based grocery company that never made it. Lots of theories on its failure have been created, but I am always amazed that most people fail to recognize one of the biggest factors that doomed Webvan. It is a lesson that too few people seem to recognize when running their own business units.