Lingolook

So here we are at last.

Just a few more miles and this leg of the journey will be over. A few more twists and turns and the road will open up. A slight reprieve before it closes in on the biggest junction of my life.

There are only two choices: left or right. Both will take me on a journey of discovery. I’ll see the world no matter which way I turn, but I’ll see it from different points of view.

One then, excludes the other.

Turn left, and join the ranks. Promotion awaits with all the rewards and satisfaction that working for a big brand can bring. Daddy brings home the trophy of success, and the family celebrates this newfound stability with a sumptuous meal and smiles all round.

Turn right and I’m on my own. A lone voice with no safety net, no support and certainly no guarantees. My family depends solely on me so the risks and consequences of failure are unthinkable.

Left is the obvious choice. I have put in ten years of sheer hard work to get to where I am today. I have a voice that counts in my corner of the world and my craft is appreciated and promoted by the corridors of power.

So why am I even considering right?

I have the Cluetrain Manifesto to thank for that.

One year ago, there was no right. There was no left either, as there was no choice.

One career, one strategy, one result.

Then the Cluetrain arrived and opened my eyes like a new religion.

I had felt the tremors of change underfoot, I had read about it while trying to deepen the consciousness of my profession, and I had even sampled its power on two occasions and in quick succession. But before Cluetrain, I had never really understood it.

As the saying goes, when the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

The Cluetrain hit me head on. I was ready for it before I even knew what it was about and once on board, everything about me changed.

And now my dear friend Richard has dragged me into this new meme, and I have to explain what the Cluetrain is and whether it’s had an impact on my professional outlook. Me?

Let’s start with question 1.

1) What does the Cluetrain manifesto mean to you? How has the book and theses influenced or not influenced you?

My answer to this question is not difficult to surmise, given the way I started this post. For me, the Cluetrain was the precursor to the events that are beginning to engulf me. But whereas before they were impossible to comprehend, now they are impossible to ignore.

It is, of course, about connections, dialogue and transparency.

It’s as much about getting inside the hearts and minds of customers as it is getting inside the hearts of businesses. It’s about breaking down corporate walls that serve no other purpose than to protect the status quo. It’s about a change in attitude that affects us in equal measure whether we are marketers or customers.

The Cluetrain Manifesto starts off with a statement that more or less sums up the entire philosophy, a phrase that succinctly pinpoints which side of the fence you’re on with the precision and real time accuracy of military grade GPS positioning systems:

“A powerful global conversation has begun.”

You’re either participating or you’re not.

Every single word of this phrase is key to understanding the true meaning of the Manifesto.

“Powerful”

Thanks to the time-honoured practice of command and control, companies have stopped listening to customers and in doing so have chosen to ignore the force, wisdom and power of the many.

Now that customers have the technology they need to interact with each other, their numbers, opinions and voices have suddenly started to count.

Even the Buddhist concept of Itai Doshin (many in body, one in mind) is built on this principle and was used to great effect by Nicherin Daishonin in the 13th Century.

“If itai doshin prevails among the people, they will achieve all their goals…”

Translation: Ignore your customers at your own peril.

“Global”

It’s bigger than you think. Everywhere people rediscover the value of their own voices, conversations will emerge. “Everywhere” on the web is not geographical, nor is it temporal. Everywhere on the web is technological so the more ways people discover to communicate their opinions, the faster their message will spread and louder their voices will resonate.

Translation: You haven’t got it covered anymore. It’s out of your control.

“Conversation”

This is the biggest word in the opening sentence and not just by size. It gives cause for existence for the first two.

As the Cluetrain makes painfully clear, marketing departments were introduced to bridge the gap between mass products and mass markets and in doing so, wiped out conversations between producers and their customers and replaced them with alienation and mystery.

Now customers have a voice, the official version of business as usual can finally be debunked in full view of everybody.

Translation: The true you is out in the open. Are you ashamed of it?

“has begun”

This is in the present perfect. i.e. it started at some point in the past and is still continuing in the present.

Translation: There’s nothing you can do about it, except join in. You can’t ignore it forever no matter how much fear you have of engaging your customers in real dialogue. The longer you wait, the bigger the gap between you and your company’s chances of survival.

In short, and in answer to question 1:

• It’s a measure of how afraid companies are of change.
• It’s an indication of how far they still have to go.
• It’s the reason companies “get it”, or not.
• It’s the reason I’m turning right.

2) Which companies have best implemented the Cluetrain Manifesto in your opinion and how were they effective?

Like Richard I am not in a position to give any real answer to this. Yet the one thing I do know, which won’t surprise any of you, is that the number of those that haven’t implemented it far outweigh those that have.

Having said that, I also don’t think that the Cluetrain Manifesto is something you simply slot in to a business model. Each company has it’s own take on how much they are prepared to let go and my feeling here is the bigger their exposure to risk, the shorter the leash on transparency.

Many of the companies in my own area act as if it’s in the interests of everyone to keep things as they are. After all, millions of dollars worth of marketing processes have been painstakingly put in place and the system can’t justify a reversal in policy just because Joe Public wants a say in things.

I know it’s unfair and I know it’s not correct but until Joe Public makes a large enough fuss so that the company panics into a response, the shift isn’t going to happen.

Dell backed its way out of a very ugly situation thanks to a change in mindset and was advised extremely well by those behind its digital media arm. Yet I can’t help feeling that others are waiting for a similar catastrophic reason to get involved, as if it were Plan B or even C on their crisis management policy rather than an opportunity to rekindle all the trust and loyalty squandered over the years through command and control policies.

The other hole in the system comes from the companies who should be advising big corporations to give it a go. Again, in my experience, there are often more important and more lucrative things on the table. Balancing a shift in approach, commitment and transparency with the laws of diminishing returns on the significant investments needed to keep a social media presence afloat isn’t something they have the balls to push through right now.

Perhaps the market isn’t ready for it just yet. Perhaps Joe Public isn’t ready to take on the liberties offered to him by the Cluetrain Manifesto, no matter how ideologically sound it may be. I don’t think this is it.

In my experience, the few of us who get it don’t have the necessary influence to bring its principles to the discussion table, no matter how hard we try and for how long.

As it turns out, fear runs at very high levels.

In the unofficial blog I created to test the conversational water for Acer, TheAcerGuy, I have tried to apply the Cluetrain principles from the start, only publishing reviews of Acer products written by genuine customers, who are given full control over their message and a semi-official platform upon which their voices can be published, whether they are helping, complaining, gloating or venting.

Once over the initial and understandable fear of losing objectivity, this approach has turned out to be the single most intelligent thing I have so far done with the site.

Yet no matter how good the reviews, I cannot convince any of my superiors to see the immense value in this approach.

Again, another reason I’m turning right.

3) In thesis 57, the Cluetrain manifesto states, “smart companies will get out of the way and help the inevitable to happen sooner.” In light of that thesis, is encouraging employees to use social media and blogging a good idea? Is it really effective, when an employee is encouraged but not directed?

Again, my response to this question is based entirely on what my limited experience has taught me.

In the IT world, there are two approaches to corporate blogging: indirect and full on.

HP has, at last count, 66 blogs (http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/blogs/bloggers.html) and all of them without exception have this footer:

“Opinions expressed here and in any corresponding comments are the personal opinions of the original authors, not of HP and may not have been reviewed in advance by HP.”

Over at Dell, there is just one blog, and no footer.

On the contrary there is a single page dedicated to underlining the commitment to standing behind the conversations http://direct2dell.com/one2one/about.aspx

Both companies’ blogs contain articles by people trained to stick by the corporate message, but one of them puts the interests of the company first, so that you read the blog through a sort of legal filter that at a moment’s notice would distance itself from a perilous comment to save the integrity of the company.

Meanwhile the other stands by what it says. Everything there is on the record and policy.

I know which approach I trust more.

4) How can a company encourage employees to use social media, and empower them to answer customer questions and learn from customers?

By understanding that respect, trust and loyalty are the greatest assets a company possesses, and that through these core values, a company builds a reputation for excellence and permission to engage its customers.

By building an environment that promotes these values among its employees before anything else.

By carefully explaining the opportunities and implications of social media to its employees with regular updates and raining sessions.

By showing trust in its employees by allowing them to engage freely in answering customer questions.

By standing by its employees if the conversation becomes negative.

From a concierge of a downtown hotel to the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, if there’s love, then that will come through in the conversation.

5) Do all employees want to talk with customers? If not what percentage want to internetwork and converse?

Again, I am not the right person to answer this question but I have an observation. From my own conversations, I have found people willing to talk from the most unlikely situations and reluctance from the most obvious.

Current thinking says that people in command should do the talking but that’s not the case.

I have college students willing to answer on behalf of a client, support staff from a repair center in the middle of nowhere desperate to change the way they talk to customers and managers who like the idea but don’t have the clout (or the balls) to start.

Not everyone can hold a conversation. Not everyone should. It would be nice if all CEOs had mega-personalities but as so often happens this is hardly ever the case.

I believe that companies should listen to themselves before launching an online presence and allow anyone on the payroll to have a say if they want to. If they’re honest, they only have to gain from the experience.

Now that I’ve answred all five questions it was supposed to be my turn to nominate another five people to do the same. Cluetrain doesn’t follow rules and besides, there is only one person I want to hear from regarding Cluetrain, and she needs no introduction from me. So over to you Valeria Maltoni.

I am going to be keeping my eye on this meme, especially as Groundswell seems to be gaining momentum. In the meantime, if you’re interested in reading more on this subject and how it’s affected people like me and businesses like your clients’, you couldn’t go far wrong with these:

Cluetrainings - Doc Searls - Here are the slides from the Cluetrain @ 10 talk I gave at There’sa New Conversation, in New York last month and a video of the talk… Cluetrain at 10 - The Cluetrain Manifesto is all about fundamental changes that we are living and experiencing… Approaching 10 Years After Cluetrain, Most Still Don’t Get It - Is it really the 10th anniversary of The Cluetrain Manifesto…? 2 On Cluetrain At 10 - Phil Gomes and Richard Binhammer have both answered the five questions I asked them in my post related to the critique the cluetrain manifesto…. After 10 years, most still don’t get it - the Cluetrain Manifesto … - Let’s take a couple of minutes to talk about The Cluetrain Manifesto because many of my readers are new to social media marketing… The Cluetrain Manifesto at 10 - Dell’s Richard Binhammer was kind enough to ping me in a meme going around about The Cluetrain Manifesto as it approaches its 10th anniversary… Cluetrain, 10 years after - In Forrester’s Josh Bernoff / Charlene Li blog, on how Lego changed by engaging with AFOLs (Adult Fans Of Lego, sometimes referred to as ALE: Adult Lego Enthusiasts). … Cluetrain Revisited: Doc Searls, still radical 10 years later … - Doc Searls started his talk at the Cluetrain @ 10 event talking about the genesis of The Cluetrain Manifesto… After 10 years, most still don’t get it - the Cluetrain Manifesto … - There are some people with very strong voices & Valeria Maltoni has one that’s worth listening to… The Cluetrain Manifesto Conversation - If The Cluetrain Manifesto is still news after 10 years from its publication, the conversation that ensued has evolved… Have You Heard of Cluetrain? - Just under 10 years ago a website then book was released called The Cluetrain Manifesto. I did a quickie poll on Twitter and found around half of people questioned had heard of it. Today I want to repeat the experiment here. …

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