Janet Johnson | The Art of Marketing

Why don’t CxO’s take advantage of the best productivity tool available today? Are they ignorant, or are we just not speaking their language?

Forrester Research has just released a report on Enterprise RSS, and has struck a chord that I’ve been humming a lot in my head lately - we’re drowning in data. Thanks to Richard McManus of Read/Write Web; we-who-don’t-have-subscriptions get a glimpse into the findings:

• Richard posted: “I think we all know about the issue of information overload - and the resulting value of good filters and smart aggregators. In some ways the problem is worse for enterprise employees - because as well as external news sources, they have potentially hundreds of internal RSS feeds to track via company blogs and wikis.”
• Forrester recommends enterprises adopt an Enterprise RSS solution like that from Attensa (a Portland, Oregon company and client of mine).
• Forrester: “Enterprise RSS turbo-charges the benefits of unmanaged RSS adoption with internal content syndication, filtering, and collaboration. It also provides increased security and reduces IT requirements.”

I think the problem with “this whole RSS thing” is that we don’t explain very well what it is or what it can do for a typical enterprise. They’re not ignorant, we just don’t ’splain things very well…

So here are my top three benefits of RSS for business executives to note:

1. The power of all being on the same page. I use Basecamp (a project management system) with several clients, and am automatically notified via RSS when anything is updated on any project. Notifications automatically go to Outlook - which then go to my Blackberry.
1. Every team member automatically knows the status of a project because we subscribe to changes/updates - no matter where we are in the world.
2. Any executive can get those same notifications and alerts - they’ll have access to key information “just in time” rather than waiting for team updates.
2. The right people have the right information at the right time. Let’s break this one down:
1. The right people - I have a client who’s the CEO of a company. His IT staff forgot to add him to one of the email groups in his organization - so he never got email notices sent to that particular group (which happened to be an all-company email list).
   This kind of thing happens in organizations every day. I can’t even imagine how much time IT folks spend keeping email groups up to date. With Enterprise RSS; Stephen would have the choice and control to subscribe to any feed that interested him.
2. The right information - Scott at Attensa tracks their marketplace using their platform. He posts information on an internal Wiki when he finds something substantive to note about a competitor, mergers in the market, what not.Anyone in the organization who needs market information (R&D / product management / finance) can opt into Scott’s marketplace news feed and have the information delivered to them without having to search for it on their own. Suddenly you’re leveraging the intelligence of others in your work.
3. The right time - information is delivered as it appears online. Imagine you’re a PR professional, needing to know when your product or service is mentioned anywhere online. Better than plain old Google alerts; Attensa lets you know instantly when anyone categorizes (tags) a blog post or mention with your keywords on del.icio.us or Technorati.
3. The business retains the knowledge when key employees leave. A business partner of mine says that every time an employee leaves their organization, it costs the company about $150,000 to recruit, hire and train a new employee.Imagine being able to retain and pass along the key observations, news and subscriptions (often the nuances of knowledge that are impossible to teach) of the person who’s left the company and passing it along to the new hire via their persistent searches, feed subscriptions and such. My bet is that training and ramp up time would be cut significantly through this efficient automatic knowledge transfer.

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Here is today’s version of the war between the Establishment (anyone over 30) and the Hippies back in the late 60’s… (except gas is 10x more expensive)

Establishment = corporate control Hippies = Enterprise 2.o

Scott from Attensa and I were just talking the other day about the forces that Enterprise 2.0 (or Web 2.0) adoption brings upon organizations.

So when this post from Dion Hinchcliffe at ZDNet came into my inbox via my Attensa RSS reader, I was intrigued by the title:

Enterprise 2.0 as a Corporate Culture Catalyst

On one hand, shaking, you have the management team - likely to be in their 40’s and 50’s - generally wary (Establishment = ‘fraid ee cats) of the loss of control they’re facing. Dion said it very succinctly:

“And the very openness of Web 2.0 platforms, the control and power that must be handed to every day workers for meaningful results to occur, and questions about accuracy, reliability, and security of such open repositories of information often gives business thinkers pause. Never mind that if you’re an average worker over forty years old or so (meaning most of the high-level management in most organizations), the chance that you’ve blogged or used a wiki isn’t very good. And you might view such unfamiliar tools with a fair amount of skepticism and lack of understanding.”

(And lest any reader think I’m casting aspersions to another group - I’m a 50 year old woman who’s been in management for 20 years saying these things about my peers. Gotta love ‘em.)

On the other hand, quaking, you’ve got the people who’ve embraced Web 2.0/Enterprise 2.0 tools (the Hippies in the 20’s) and want to live the collaborative, creative and connected lives that these tools promise.

Since I’ve been out on my own - apres Marqui - I have enjoyed helping companies like Chockstone, Intel’s Software Network, OpenMake, and others implement more “Enterprise 2.0″ communications strategies to:

• Engage users and prospects in the public domain - building buzz and word of mouth
• Improve collaboration in and around a company
• Understand and expose their knowledgebase to themselves and others
• Develop thought leadership
• Improve awareness and ‘find-ability’ online (and offline too)

And I will tell anyone who asks that the move to Enterprise 2.0 is going to happen in their organizations. I just hope my generation will embrace the enthusiasm of the omnivores and connectors in their organizations and implement the tools to facilitate the work they’re itching to do.

Call me an aging hippie. Peace out.

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The Pew Internet folks are at it again… they’ve just published a report on “ICT” users (great, another acronym to remember!), which stands for Information and Communication Technology users. The report profiles the 85% of Americans who have both internet access and cell phones.

It seems that we cell/internet access owners break down into three major groups and ten subgroups:

1. Those who embrace technology (I)
2. The middle range connected (my sister)
3. And low tech (my parents)

Of those 31% of the total who embrace technology, we have the following profiles:

• Omnivores - these folks exploit the connectivity and the capacity for self expression that technology has to offer.

1. Comprise 8% of the total population studied
2. Love gadgets and services
3. Are 70% male
4. Average age is between 18-29

• Connectors - who use “ICT” to stay connected and on top of digital content; and often use these devices to facilitate community and social connections.

1. Comprise 7% of the population studied
2. Are 55% female (surprise! with a label like connectors, what would we expect?)
3. Average age is between 30-49

• Lackluster Veterans - have used the internet for more than 10 years, but don’t necessarily see ICT tools as a way to increase productivity. (They’re just plain tired.)

1. Comprise 8% of the population studied
2. Are 65% male
3. Average age is between 30-49

• Productivity Enhancers - people who are optimistic that ICT tools do enhance their work and social lives.

1. Comprise 8% of the population studied
2. Are split between male and female
3. The majority are between 30-49

The middle range connected (20% of the total population) look like this:

• Mobile Centric - those who rely on their mobile devices (by far over internet use) for voice, texting or entertainment.

1. Comprise 10% of the total population studied
2. Skew slightly male (52%)
3. Are 18-29 years old

• Connected but Hassled - they have the technology, but consider it intrusive. (They’re likely longing for a bath and a good book.)

1. Comprise 9% of the total population studied
2. Female (59%)
3. Are 30-49 years old

The remaining 49% of the population are considered relatively low tech.

• Inexperienced Experimenters - in this group we find folks who like to dabble, but don’t feel they have the experience to do more. (This is where the 75M blogs come from! Those who start one, and don’t go back…)

1. Comprise 8% of the total population studied
2. Female (61%)
3. Median age is 50 years old

• Light but Satisfied - have some technology, but they really don’t think it does that much for them.

1. Comprise 15% of the total population studied
2. Female (57%)
3. Median age is 53 years old

• Indifferents - these are the folks who have technology, but it doesn’t play a central role in their lives.

1. Comprise 11% of the total population studied
2. Male (52%)
3. Median age is 47

• Off the Grid - these are the folks who don’t have an internet connection or a mobile phone (or, as my friend Debbie says, “mobile device”). Guess the demographics:

1. Comprise 15% of the total population studied
2. More likely Female (57%)
3. Median age is 64

You’re likely marketing your products to a mix of these people, but should consider your emerging prospects.

Do they skew young? You’ll want to provide mobile/engagement opportunities.

Are they off the grid? You’ll want to market to them more traditionally - not surprisingly, the off the grid folks watch a lot of television… and they probably do still love their mail.

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Ross McKillop of Simplehelp has reviewed a nice compilation of RSS Readers. Taking the guesswork out of it for the rest of us, he’s provided screenshots, and quick review of each reader. As I’ve mentioned before, subscribing to information is a great way to make sure you’re up-to-date on all the news and information that’s important to you.

Ross has providing a time-saving article to select the right time-saving tool for you.

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I have been talking to advocates and ‘fraidy-cats of enterprise 2.0 tools lately, and the ‘fraidy cats seem to significantly outnumber the advocates at this point. But I was reminded of a post about a year ago by Ross Mayfield where he wrote of the Power Law of Participation.

(As an aside - he twittered that it was the French who noted “the more things change, the more they stay the same” just today. How apropos. Gotta love technology!)

In this post, he spoke of the participation curve (very much a long tail) where most people interact with social media by Reading it, and so few have a high level of engagement by Collaborating, Moderating or Leading it.

Here’s the curve…

Ross Mayfield’s Power Law of Participation Curve

JJ’s Tools for Participation:

1. Most people in business read their news and information, by actively searching for it online, using their favorite (or default) browser.
2. Some people will mark their favorite articles using tools like Digg (where you can vote and promote your favorite stories) and del.icio.us (where you can share your favorites); or by using bookmarks in your browser (if you don’t want to share - but want to reference them).
3. And fewer people tag (or categorize) their articles using tools like del.icio.us (where you can tag articles for yourself and share with others). Smart bloggers tag/categorize their posts so search engines can more easily find them and serve them up as a result in searches.
4. Even fewer people (mostly other bloggers) will comment on stories they either like or disagree with, using the tools provided on most social media sites… you simply enter your comments in the comment box, confirm your identity, and you’re a commenter! (I blogged earlier about the prominence of “lurkers” online.) As noted, most people merely lurk - or read.
5. Subscribing to information is easy, and I have a feeling Ross might change the graph at this point to reflect more subscribers than commenters. RSS readers (like Attensa (for business use) / myYahoo! (a personal reader) are free. Like a magazine subscription, using one is like having news and articles delivered right to you as they appear (vs. searching for them).
6. Sharing can take many forms. Sites like Flicker (photos) and YouTube (videos) make it easy to share information with your friends - anytime you run across an article that invites you to “send to a friend” you’re sharing. Google allows you to share calendars, spreadsheets and more, making it handy to share with those even outside your own organization. And the new kid on the block, Twitter, let’s you tell the whole world exactly what you’re doing right now - should you choose to share it.
7. Been invited into someone’s LinkedIn network lately? It’s probably the most recognizable networking site for professionals. Hint: recruiters comb them regularly to find potential employees - so if you’re looking, get LinkedIn.
8. Writing is surprisingly simple to do - using blogging tools like WordPress, Movable Type or Blogger. Anyone who joins MySpace will automatically be invited to start a blog. Many blogging tools are free, and come with templates you can choose to get started (which is why so many blogs look the same, with their blue bar across the top and white title text…).
9. The best refactor example I’ve seen is what designers and artist have done making logos Web 2.0′ish by updating them graphically. It’s fun to see how they’ve morphed from makeovers. I’m refactoring in a way by blogging about another blog post - and now my readers have the benefit of increased exposure to new voices, newer ideas.
10. Collaboration tools include wikis - which are great for organizing information on a web site - project management tools like basecamp, and others. (Here in Portland, we have a wonderful collaboration software company developing tools for enterprise 2.0 called Jive Software - read their top 10 benefits for companies collaborating here…)

Oddly enough, a year ago Ross reported that in Wikipedia, 500 people, or 0.5% of users (in 2006), accounted for 50% of the edits. That’s moderating - and (I’d add) leadership.

I always recommend that you start understanding social media sites by reading. And that you make it easy for yourself by subscribing. And once you’re ready to put your toe in the participation water, begin commenting. Once you’ve begun to participate, you’ll learn how it feels to share, network, write, and collaborate effectively online.

Leadership (in this moment, in every business) is just that. Spread the cheer. Just try to do it online.

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May 6, 2007   |  Posted by Janet Johnson  |     (2) Comments