Transforming Your Company & Fostering the Internal Groundswell
As discussed in previous blog posts, there are many ways to engage and tap into the groundswell. These include listening to, talking to, energizing, and sustaining the groundswell. Upon reading the ninth chapter of Groundswell, we learned of the last technique --embracing the groundswell. As Li and Bernoff comment, although it is a great way to get feedback on product development and projected product success, it can be a challenge to collaborate with your customers. No matter how difficult, it is important to engage with your customers because they want to connect and give you their feedback. Since they are already doing so via blogs, ratings, videos, and reviews it is in your companies best interest to embrace the feedback directly, in a positive manner.
The two best ways to embrace the groundswell is to (1) act upon its suggestions and modify products and (2) keep the doors of communication open by following the steps of talking to, listening to, energizing and supporting your groundswell. By doing this, you are "making customers an integral part of the way you innovate with both products and process improvements" (Li & Bernoff, 183).
A good example of a company embracing the groundswell and taking in its suggestions is Lay's Potato Chips. In 2012, Lay's decided that it was time for a new flavor to be released-hence the creation of the Do Us a Flavor contest . The basis of the contest was that consumer were to submit their ideal chip flavor and then others could vote for their favorite by selecting the button "I'd eat that". The flavors with the most votes would become finalist and then a final winner would be chosen (based on # of votes) and they would not only get their chip produced but they would also win a monetary prize of one million dollars {🤑💰}. Lay's not only asked for ideas on product development, they also acted upon the suggestions and created the most popular flavors, showing that they cared about the ideas of the groundswell.
They ran the contest again in 2014, 2015, and most recently in 2017. A total of 19 different potato chip flavors have been put out since the contest's inception in 2012. By embracing the groundswell and allowing its consumers to have an active voice in what flavors they would buy, Lay's was able to engage with their customers through a fun, interactive website that many people visited multiple times a week to save their favorite flavor. They even created a Daily Flavorcast map for visitors.
Lay's followed the guidelines of embracing the groundswell and continued to engage with the groundswell on Facebook--keeping the door to active communication open.
It is important to note that crowd-sourcing, asking the groundswell to give you ideas, is different from embracing the groundswell in that you are only asking for ideas and not acting upon them. If Lay's had just asked for suggestions but never made any of them, it wouldn't be effectively engaging in the groundswell and showing its consumers that it cared about their input. While including your customers in the development and innovation process is important, it can be extremely challenging. You must find a balance between embracing the groundswell outside of your organization and trusting the groundswell within your company, because in the end you hired them to help your company succeed.
One of the most important lessons to be learned is how to interact with the most valuable groundswell community--your internal one. Without communicating effectively and compassionately within your own company, you will not be arming your employees with the tools they need to help your company thrive. For this reason, it is important to be completely open to the concept of the creating a positive relationship with the groundswell within your organization. According to Li & Bernoff, many corporations throughout the world connect their employees via internal social networks, collaborations on wikis and contributions to idea exchanges. These applications "tap the power of the groundswell of ideas among the people who know best how your business runs..." (p. 216). By giving your employees the power to connect with executives while also helping each other, you have the ability to operate smarter and more efficiently. In establishing a simultaneous communication channel and collaboration tool, many companies realize that it's about relationships not technology. It is also crucial to encourage management's active participation. Li & Bernoff offer the following advice: to nurture your internal groundswell "promote a listening culture from the top down, ease and encourage participation [don't require it] with incentives, and find and empower the rebels in your organization" (p. 227).
As many know, the groundswell has the power to define your brand, as they see fit, and make or break your company. You must realize that the groundswell is going to transform the way that your company has always operated. As Li and Bernoff state "you become so engaged with your customers that you walk in step with their needs and wants" (p. 199). Companies can prepare for this transformation by (1) starting off small, (2) educating your executives, (3) getting the right people to run your strategy, (4) getting your agency and technology partners in sync, and (5) planning for the long term. By doing this you are able to begin actively benefiting from the groundswell by learning what it is and how to interact with it. In following these steps, you can prepare your company for a successful journey into the ubiquitous groundswell.
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We Want to Hear From You!
Did you learn a lot from this book? Has it helped you to look at marketing and social media management in a different way? Do you have any other ideas on best practices to connect successfully with the groundswell?
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