I don’t know if it’s a fear of blogs or a total disregard for their power, but too many companies are underestimating this medium. I can understand that if a blog only gets 20,000 visitors a month that some companies might see it as insignificant. However, if a major publication or independent publisher such as Slashdot pick up on the story then that 20,000 becomes millions quickly.
If a blog publisher is going to have a significant amount of people going to their blog then you know that they are fairly passionate about what they do. If I am NetFlix and I see a request from a
Being a transparent company or one that claims to cater to their customers is not a selective option. You cannot pick and choose who you wish to give the best customer service towards because everyone should be important. The beauty of what Hacking NetFlix was doing was giving free PR to NetFlix. Word-of-Mouth advertising from loyal customers for nothing. How many times do people come up to your company asking if they can help spread the word? If and when it does happen will you turn them away?
Of course there is a reason to fear blogs if you do all the wrong things. Blogs help to bring out what is really on in the minds of consumers. Maybe that is what NetFlix thought. If that is the case then they already have deeper problems within their organization that need to be resolved.
Blogs can either be your enemy or your best friend depending on the principles within your organization. After reading the entry at Hacking NetFlix I have to question the principles of NetFlix. They are targetting a new niche in the movie rental industry and one where we are passing the early adopter stage so I would think it would be in NetFlix’s best interest to help the early adopters convince everyone else to use their service. This truly was a missed opportunity.
About Mike Rundle
The more things change, the more they stay the same. Remove every instance of blogs in your post above and replace it with community sites and you’ve got things that were happening a few years back in 2000 and 2001. During the tail end of the dot com bomb a lot of community sites were asking themselves the same questions. They directed tons of traffic to the sites of major companies because they loved their products, yet most of these companies couldn’t care less about them.
If you haven’t read it yet, check out Gonzo Marketing by Christopher Locke. It sort of offers an opportunity for companies to get in the game and start giving back to these communities surrounding them as you wished would happen in your post. In otherwords, instead of being a soulless corporation, they can instead be a group of people who actually care about the people who use their products and who share their “interests”.
What is funny is that back when Gonzo Marketing got released (and before I even knew the book existed) I was trying to think up of a way for these communities to support themselves. I even had a conversation with David Weinberger of Small Pieces, Loosely Joined (and of the Cluetrain Manifesto) about what could be done to help them. I even had a revelation early one morning, that got me out of bed at 4 AM and just flowed out of me. When I relayed what I have wrote to David, he said that I should check out his friends Chris’ book called Gonzo Marketing, as our solutions to the problem were very similar (yet still varied).
I won’t go into my revelation here but needless to say it followed a somewhat similar approach to Christopher Locke’s in that for things to change, companies would have to start giving back and supporting these communities of people that surrounded them. The problem today, however, is the same problem back then. Companies still don’t seem to care. Or to put it another way, since some companies may be offended by this wording of “not caring”, these companies don’t see any logical reason as to why they should have to give something back to these communities. In their minds, I’m assuming they are thinking if we are getting free publicity from these communities, why should we have to do anything in return. Free is free.
I find this kind of thought hilarious. Why? Because it was probably the same response from users to companies who offered free services during the dot com period. Why should we give anything back if it’s free? Why? Because if you truly value the service and care about the company, then you need to support them otherwise they will eventually fold which is what exactly happened. Companies couldn’t afford to keep offering free services, as none of them had endless supplies of money.
The same could be said for these community sites. They are giving so much to these companies, yet these companies don’t seem to value what they are getting in return. While some may say it is free advertising, I like to put it another way. It is “guaranteed” advertising. These community sites are directing interest and traffic to these companies. Now think about how much money these companies put into online marketing to attract people to their site. Think about how they pay marketing companies money to run their ad banners to “hopefully” attract people to their site. You getting the picture? On one side, you have a guaranteed traffic flow of interest and attraction to your company from these communities and on the other side you have the “possibility” of traffic flow. Now ask yourself, how much would you as a company pay for each click (Cost Per Click) to your web site. Hmmm, kind of sounds like Googles AdWords doesn’t it. Now again think about how much traffic is flowing from these communities sites to these company sites without a single penny going back to these communities. What is even more hilarious is that most of these communities try to support themselves through ads banners or text ads that don’t even RELATE to their site’s interest.
Actually here’s another little twist on things. Imagine if someone came up with a scheme where community sites could support themselves somehow miraculously through some new online marketing scheme. Imagine the money flowing in from this new marketing scheme was directly proportional to the amount of loyal visitors to that site. By loyal visitor, I mean someone who returns to the site again and again, preferably upon a daily basis. Now guess which web site, based upon these calculations would be making more money at this point from this new marketing scheme. The official company sites? Ah, no. There is no community at these sites because often times there isn’t enough indepth information there. Most people usually visit these sites for the little brochureware info they get and then head off in search of more information. Where is the indepth information? At the community sites of course. The community sites are where people keep coming back again and again because that is where the content is that they seek. Now guess how soon these companies would start trying to develop their own community sites, so that they could attract the loyal users which would direct the flow of money from this new marketing scheme to them.
Finally (as this is getting way too long), imagine if every community site stopped linking to the company sites that they supported. Wonder what would happen? No more free advertising from community sites. Wonder if these companies sites would care?
While I agree that Netflix dropped the ball on getting more word-of-mouth marketing I don’t blame them. Blogging is still new within the business community and most companies don’t really know what it is or the benefits it could bring.
Look at it from Netflix’s point of view. The PR department gets an email from some random person who has a fan website and wants questions and answers. This takes valuable time from other PR related work. Not saying this is right but would the PR department rather spend their time answering an individuals questions or working on a press release to major newspapers/TV stations around the country.
I use Netflix, I like it and I will continue to spread the word whether they participate or not.
Uh blogging is not new. Just another name for the same old thing. It is newer technology yes, but it is still a community site where people can gather to discuss things. You’re right though, companies still don’t see the benefits of maintaining this community. Geez, why would they want to interact with, get close to, and keep their customers. Beyond me. :)
As for taking “valuable time” away from their PR people, well isn’t that what PR is about. Attracting interest to your company so people will be aware of your products and buy them? To me the problem is that the Web today (yes even today) is still an afterthought. I find it hilarious when they do all their marketing and then at the end though go, “Geez, maybe we should have a website”. So what do they do? They throw up a brochureware site that relates little or nothing and also promotes little or no interest or interaction with their customers. Hmmm, maybe that is why companies today still don’t invest enough in it, compared to other mediums, because they are not seeing the return they want, primarily because they aren’t doing enough to actually interest their customers. Really it as almost as though these companies were scared to actually start a relationship with their customers that actually had some depth to it. Imagine a corporation with a soul. Scary kids! :)
To respond to an inquiry from a fan takes valuable time, but are they not still valuable customers. Look at it from this perspective. Say they did answer the questions and that short question and answer session caused 1,000 of Hacking NetFlix’s readers to subscribe to NetFlix. Then you have
Taking the valuable time to help your company gain a quarter of a million dollars isn’t worth it?
Makes you wonder.
What about the future of the actual dvd rental shop? Must they change to Nextflix style?
We are worried about, here in Brazil….what do you think?
Thanks
ALberto