citizen Evangelist

Ben McConnel Announced today the formation of the Society for Word of Mouth. I was so excited to see the formation of a group that is focused on the right aspects of Word of Mouth that I was compelled to jump into the fray:

View my page on Society for Word of Mouth

So many of the groups that I’ve come across are looking short-cuts and and artificial means to get awareness of a product or service. At the end of the day, these programs may get buzz and exposure, and that may create certain short-term benefits to the organizations who leverage these strategies, but not with out consequences. The holy grail in any strategy is providing real value to a real person… and doing so in a way that so uniquely meets their specific needs that they can’t help but to share those experiences with others.This is not easy.

This is not accomplished over night.

But, this is the most valuable achievement that can be made. I’m looking forward to participating in this group of like minded individuals.

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Thanks to Seth Godin for pointing out Kevin Kelly’s post on 1000 true fans. I love it when others can eloquently put my thoughts into usable format. There are many companies, artists, and practitioners out in the world today that are looking for their opportunity to break through the noise and escape the perils of getting lost in the long-tail of competitive offerings.

In this evolving market place, the smartest thing a company or producer can do is to focus on a specific customer or customer segment and delight the hell out of them. If you can (as Godin would say) “be remarkable,” you’ll earn the opportunity to access their friends. With each new fan you build, become remarkable to them as well… the growth will start out slow, but with dedication to the process, the momentum will carry you.

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Part of being a good citizen is participation in the primary and election process. In that spirit, I made it a priority to visit my polling precinct to cast my vote for my preferred candidate. This is my first time participating in this process in Texas. Of course, they do everything a little different in Texas. Last night, I spent a few minutes brushing upon the Texas Primary / Caucus process. The details are a bit more than I expected. That said, I was able to put these pieces together:

• When you show up, you must declare if you’re voting Democrat or Republican. I was happy to discover that Texas didn’t require prior declaration with either party, so I was free to make my choice upon arrival.
• Voting would be for the Primary.
• The Primary would account for ~2/3 of the pledged delegates for the state
• Immediately after the polls close, the Caucuses would begin
• Participation in the Caucus would require ‘being present’ and signing a form of some sort
• Any participant could support the same or a different candidate (though I assume it has to be within the same party)
• The amount of attendance for each candidate would some how influence the caucus results
• The caucus results would then account for the remaining 1/3 of the pledged delegates for the state

My Polling location for the Primary was a high school just up the street. We faced a near catastrophe when the power switch linking the Hart InterCivic eSlate to the JBC (fancy talk for Judge Booth Controller). This snafu ground the process to a halt for 30 minutes, giving me enough time to enjoy fond memories of high school as all the students made their ways from one class to another. After a few apologies to the growing line, a support call or two (I’ll assume it was <a title=”Hart InterCivic Customer Care” href=”http://www.hartic.com/pages/13″>Customer Care</a>) the team was able to revive 5 of the 10 or so voting booths.

Now… I’ve been following the presidential primaries with great interest, but the ballot I was presented with made me realize just how ignorant I am regarding local politics. It sure seems like it would be a natural extension to allow some information (other than name) to be provided so that I can make an informed decision if I wanted to. As a result of my ignorance, I found myself not voting in any category other than the presidential primary. I don’t feel good about that, but I couldn’t cast my vote without any information or context.

The next question I face is whether I will venture back out for the caucus. At this point, it is about 60 minutes until the event is scheduled to start and it just may be worth my time to observe this additional piece of the process.

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Seth Godin responded to an earlier post by Joel Spolsky on the Customer Service. Now… unbeknownst to either of these guys is the fact that they are elite members of a team known as my virtual mentors. They have consistently demonstrated over the years that they are worthy of such an esteemed position…

That said, I’m some dissappointed in their posts on this topic.

Note the wikipedia definition of Customer Service:

Customer service is the provision of service to customers before, during and after a purchase.

In each case, Seth & Joel talk about Customer Service as being isolated to after a purchase. They also reference this as a lowly role that requires a career path and a escalation proces.

See.. that begins to speak at the heart of the problem here. Customer service is servicing the customer. It is the core of what business is and always will be about. It is not a lowly position, it is the only responsibility of an organization. Service the customer and the customer will compensate.

Last fall, I came across a box which really opened my eyes on what’s going on: Noise, by Bart Kosko, shows how it is often difficult to differentiate the signal from the noise, and that often times, the signal in one situation is noise in another. And yes, I realize my characterization of this makes it sound much more esoteric than it is. Consider this: There are too many things that can go wrong and do go wrong before, during, and after the purchase by a customer. In order to reduce the “noise” from the customer, organizations place “resistors” and “transformers” between the customer and the brain in the company. The job of these circuits is to suppress bad signal / noise and to route boost good signals.

The problem: they are disconnected from the brain, and this latency creates its own noise.

I won’t spend a great deal of time droning on because this topic is more than worthy of a book (and has been, many times over). But, I’ll leave you with this one thought: a real life mentor of mine has always taught me that the most important way to structure the organization is this:

Customer
People dealing directly with the customer
People building products / services for the customer
Management of people/processes
Board of Directors

Shouldn’t we all attempt to structure ourselves around the customer?  Once again, Kathy Sierra  (another wonderful vitual mentor) asks the right question:  Who’s wagging who?

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I’ve worked on a little handout to help convey my convictions and illustrate the power of the Collaboration Revolution. I do owe credit to Ben McConnell & Jackie Huba for many of their thoughts over the years.  I’ve included a few of the points they made with some of my thoughts.

I also used photos from iStockphoto to pull off the appearance.  I’m certain that I probably need to attribute them in the document as well.

In any event, I hope that you find this useful.

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