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To see a live example of this in your own industry, visit
www.my3cents.com
.

Although it is a very US-centric site, a search on my3cents.com by industry can show you how powerful customers banding together can be. A search about the banking sector brings up posts like 'Bank XYZ – Not like all the other banks – WORSE!' (I won't give the actual name of the bank in question here, as I don't know if it deserves this criticism.) Another reads 'Big banks need to follow rules too'.

According to their website:

My3cents.com is a leading source of real consumer advice. Visitors come to learn, interact and voice opinions regarding companies, products and services in our open community. Learn from other consumer experiences, and help others learn from your own personal consumer experiences. Join the revolution today and start being heard!

The truth is My 3 Cents is not that popular a website, but there are hundreds just like it, such as CRM Low Down which gives people an opportunity to vent, or more importantly find out about certain products and companies. Dom's example on Facebook and those you will find on sites like My 3 Cents are evidence of the increasing transparency and accountability I have been talking about, which is one of the four forces of change we are faced with daily. The result of this and other changes discussed in this book is that the power of customers and staff is increasing and the power of companies is decreasing. Of course, organisations of all kinds, public and private, continue to wield great power in many areas, but there is no question that the balance of power is shifting towards the most profitable customers and the most talented staff. Customers and staff have more choice than they ever did before, and they will have even more choice in the future.

The explosion of the blogosphere, platforms like MySpace and user-generated content that we see on YouTube are all part of the consumer voice. It is easier to be heard (or read) now than ever before and search technology makes it simpler to find specific information on what you need. More and more consumers, and businesses too, will do a search before making a purchase or a decision about a product or service. Job applicants are Googling a company to see what other people say about it and giving more weight to these opinions than to what may be on the company's own website.

I say embrace the transparency. Once upon a time it would have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to truly find out how a customer felt about your product. Now it takes a few hours and a free internet search. If I was a senior leader at Bank XYZ, I would want to know what happened to the customer who is now complaining on My 3 Cents. If I was the Aussie bank that Dom was complaining about I would want to read his post, and all the comments, to find out how I could improve my services.

I personally know this experience well. Every week I present to an audience, sometimes as small as six and other times as big as a few thousand. As disturbing as feedback can be, you need to suck it up and learn from it, both the good and the bad.When I first launched my blog I disabled comments. Why? Because it was integrated into my commercial website, and the last thing I wanted was a client looking to engage me in their business to be reading things other people say about my ideas and work, things over which I had no control. Talk about missing the point. It is about dialogue these days, not monologue. It is a conversation, not a passive dictation. I have since changed my approach to this, and with the exception of the odd inappropriate link (I think you know what I mean) that some computer-generated program has placed there, we leave all comments as is.

Having said this, such public dialogue is not to be taken lightly. General Motors ran a competition where anyone could make their own commercial for the new Chevy Tahoe (in conjunction with Donald Trump's television show
The Apprentice
). Firstly it should be noted that GM's foray into viral marketing was incomplete from the outset. Even within the strictures set out by GM (they provided the videos that users could use, so it wasn't
entirely
user-generated), there was still a significant consumer backlash which made the whole campaign backfire.

A vicious slew of global-warming based criticisms and anti-SUV vitriol whipped around the web in the wake of the appeals for consumer involvement. GM was quick to remove some of the 'offensive' content, although to their credit they left some of the more benign critical ads online.

GM had an opportunity to learn from this backlash. As one blogger noted:

. . . instead of chocking this up to a bad marketing decision, they could really use the information here. There are a growing number of people who believe that the proliferation of SUVs is getting ridiculous. Does everyone need a vehicle that can climb snowy mountains?

But what SUVs solve for many is a 'cooler' alternative to minivans for their growing families.
⁹

GM's decision to remove some of the ads just created more controversy and backlash. As another blogger responded:

Dear Chevy: Gas mileage, the environment, and big cars are not exactly a new issue. Hell, I got 32 miles per gallon on a 1967 Toyota Corolla! What did you think the public would do, given the chance?
¹⁰

The company, however, claim they left all the ads online with the exception of vulgar and offensive content. Chevy general manager Ed Peper commented on his company blog:

Early on we made the decision that if we were to hold this contest, in which we invite anyone to create an ad, in an open forum, that we would be summarily destroyed in the blogosphere if we censored the ads based on their viewpoint. So, we adopted a position of openness and transparency, and decided that we would welcome the debate. (As an aside, we have been truly disappointed by the number of submissions we had to filter out because of their vulgar content.) . . . We at GM are not culturally unaware; we realize that there are people who would never purchase an SUV. That's why we make more vehicles that get over 30 miles-pergallon than any other manufacturer . . .

So, a few media pundits seem to think this social media program was a failure and others seem to revel in the apparent anarchy. We, on the other hand, welcome the opportunity to clarify the facts regarding fuel economy, vehicles equipped with E85 capability, and consumer choice. In our opinion, this has been one of the most creative and successful promotions we have done . . . Anyway, it sure got people talking about the Tahoe. Which was the whole idea, after all.
¹¹

That's a cracking response from GM. So they got it about half right, I guess. It is great to see big companies harnessing the power of blogs and releasing videos on YouTube. These are powerful technologies. Individuals are not afraid to use them and business shouldn't be either.

Doritos threw the door open to consumers to make their own ads, and it worked really well. They ran a competition where people could put together an ad for their favourite Doritos flavour and make it themselves, then submit it to Doritos. The contest attracted over one thousand entries (which is actually heaps, when you think about how much work has to go into creating an ad). The two winning ads – 'Live the flavour', created by Wes Phillips (age 22), and 'Check out girl', created by Dale Backus (age 21) – were made on a $12 budget and were screened during the 2007 Super Bowl.
Very cool!
This is the same company that actually let consumers design new
flavours.
Both campaigns have been hugely successful.

What is most exciting about this trend is that while web 2.0 is about user-generated content, web 3.0 and web 4.0 are going to add
huge
value to the consumer, and companies that do a great job will tap into the power of word of mouse for the positive. The word will spread loud and clear who the market leaders are, and what products and services you should buy, and what the best companies are to work for.

Here is what the evolution might look like. The idea comes from Tim Berners-Lee, who is widely credited with inventing the world wide web, and is what he had envisioned it to be like all along.Web 3.0 is often referred to as the
semantic web.
This means it is about ordering and giving meaning to content and information. It refers to both a
philosophy
for future web design (that the content should be readily searchable and understood by software programs so it can be ordered, sorted and accessed) and also to
technologies
which enable that philosophy to be borne out.

At the moment, you can use the internet for a whole lot of useful stuff (finding the cheapest DVD and buying it, booking an airline ticket). But you can't just have a machine do that for you because web pages are designed to be read by people, not machines.
Semantic web
is a vision of an internet where computers can understand the information. Talk about fast, good, cheap and easy.Web 3.0 is not really here yet but a visit to the Media Labs at MIT would suggest it will come.

While web 2.0 is user-generated and social-networking content and web 3.0 is about a learning, semantic web, some already look ahead to what web 4.0 might be. New York-based writer and thinker Seth Godin has one interesting idea that is worth sharing: that web 4.0 could be about forming an intense and close connection with a small and intimate group of people.

Consider this flash into the future, found on his blog:

I'm typing an email to someone, and we're brainstorming about doing a business development deal with Apple. A little window pops up and lets me know that David over in our Tucscon office is already having a similar conversation with Apple and perhaps we should coordinate.

Google watches what I search. It watches what other people like me search. Every day, it shows me things I ought to be searching for that I'm not. And it introduces me to people who are searching for what I'm searching for.

I'm late for a dinner.My GPS phone knows this (because it has my calendar, my location, and the traffic status). So, it tells me, and then it alerts the people who are waiting for me.

I visit a blog for the first time.My browser knows what sort of stories I am interested in and shows me highlights of the new blog based on that history.

Web4 is about smaller, far more intense connections with trusted colleagues and their activities. It's a tribe.
¹²

According to Godin, for web 4.0 to become a reality he needs:

• an email client that is smart about what he is doing and what his opted-in colleagues are doing
  
• a cell phone (and cell phone provider) that is not just a phone
  
• a word processor that knows about everything he has written and anything on the web that's related to what he's writing at any given time
  
• moves by Google and Yahoo! and others to make it easy for us to become non-anonymous, all the time, everywhere we go.
  

People, companies and governments are watching what we do, our computers and the search engines we use are recording what we look for, read and say – why not use this information in a way that adds power to our lives? It might scare some people but it sure excites me.

LET THE AUDIENCE/CUSTOMER PLAY

Sony stumbled over this chapter's flip when players of its EverQuest game created a black economy via PayPal to buy and sell virtual assets in the game's alternative online world. Sony told its customers in effect, 'We want to control those game features and any income stream associated with them.' Sony's customers said, 'Bugger off. It's our game now.' In the face of massive customer resentment, Sony had to back down. In doing so, it allowed EverQuest to continue to grow and continue to pour profits into its corporate coffers. Sony won loyalty and profits by losing control.

In a different version of events some companies have set out to deliberately exploit the desire of the audience to participate. Reality TV is one example and its most successful franchise is the Idol format. There are
Australian Idol, American Idol,
the original British show
Pop Idol
and more than thirty other Idol franchises in countries around the world. The Idol shows not only star amateur talent, but the results of the shows' talent competitions are determined by viewers' votes. Viewer choice also determines the outcome on other extremely successful reality shows such as
Survivor
and
Big Brother
. It is no longer enough to passively watch a TV show. We want to participate and vote off the people we don't like.

In addition to making the actual shows extremely popular, driving up traditional advertising revenue, the reality format lends itself perfectly to be more integrated with other mediums – such as the internet – which also drive revenues. Perhaps the most significant spin-off however is the revenue from voting itself. It is no secret that the voting format is a big cash spinner. One of the big winners here in Australia would be Legion Interactive, who facilitate the voting. Legion Interactive obviously don't publish this information, but former judge Ian Dickson once let slip that one episode had drawn 1.4 million calls at inflated per-minute costs.

To get some idea of the power of this new format, which perfectly taps the desire of the audience to have more control over their experience, check out this information that appeared in a white paper on the Idol format by interactive marketing specialist SMLXL:

• Over 3.2 billion viewers over the past six years.
  
• The thirty-plus countries the format is aired in cover a total of 560 million TV households.
  
• There were 215 million unique viewers for the final alone.
  
• During the past five years
  Pop Idol
  viewers have generated 1.9 billion votes.
  
• The fourth
  American Idol,
  which took place in the US autumn of 2004, was at the time the biggest texting event in the world, with 41 million SMS text message–based votes cast.What is more remarkable is that 30 per cent of those texters had never sent a text message before.
  
• The 2004 figures turned out to be only the beginning, with the spring 2006 run of
  American Idol
  attracting 64.5 million SMS votes.
  
• New applications include trivia, sweepstakes entries, TXT chats, a fan club and a vote number reminder, and downloadable ring tones.
  
• It just keeps getting bigger – 680 million votes in the last twelve months.
  
• For a typical twenty-episode run, viewers have about fourteen opportunities to vote.