Categories: Articles

Don't Just Join The Conversation… React To It

When Blogging first started to get some serious steam, I remember the rule of thumb being that you should try to post – at least – once a week. As Blogging continued to grow, the stakes were raised. A good rule of thumb right now might be to Blog daily or – at the very least – a couple of times a week. It’s amazing to see how quickly things change, and it’s equally impressive to see how many new Blogs come online – each and every day – that have something unique and engaging to say.

You can take the example above and apply it to understanding the myriad of conversations that are taking place online (right now) about your company, brand, products and services. Six Pixels of Separation friend, Joseph Jaffe (Blogger/Podcaster at Jaffe Juice and author of, Life After The 30-Second Spot) titled his latest book, Join The Conversation (if you have not read it, do yourself a favour and grab a copy now. Tell you what, I have an extra copy of it on my desk, so if you can’t scramble the coins together, email me and I’ll send it over). The message is just as important today as it was when he first wrote the words: all of us need to understand who’s saying what, where, why and how. Just like it was ok to Blog once a week a while back, it was equally acceptable to just monitor the conversation. And, just like that changed rapidly, so too is this. It’s not enough to just monitor anymore. It’s time to start reacting.

No companies have truly joined the conversation is all they’re doing is monitoring what’s being said and where.

Just this morning I was listening to the May 23rd, 2008 episode of C.C. Chapman‘s most excellent Podcast, Managing The Gray. The episode (titled, Comcast Wins With Twitter) is a quick seven-minute story about how C.C. got some pretty interesting customer service from Comcast after a complaint he posted on his Twitter account. Comcast could have just been monitoring the online channels to gage voice of customer, but instead he got a reaction which led to a result (one that was very satisfying to C.C. and wound up getting Comcast some good PR in return – not to mention some additional Google Juice).

Think about that – if all you’re doing at this juncture is monitoring what people are saying, how are you really improving customer experience and building your brand? While it once was good to know that a company was even bothering with Google Alerts or a Technorati Watchlist, the game is ever-changing and now is the time to start executing a long-term plan and vision towards reacting and, ultimately, really joining the conversation.

Mitch Joel

Mitch Joel lives at the intersection of technology, business transformation and consumer culture. He is the Executive Director of Next Era Institute, a strategic intelligence platform helping leaders understand the forces reshaping business, technology, culture and society. The Institute identifies which shifts matter, explores their wider significance and translates them into strategic direction and momentum. Mitch is also a globally recognized keynote speaker. He has delivered thousands of presentations across both B2B and B2C industries to organizations including Google, Walmart, LEGO, Shopify, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble and Unilever. Strategy Magazine has called him “one of North America’s leading visionaries.” Mitch built his career by working directly inside the waves of change that reshaped modern business. He founded and built a digital marketing agency that worked with some of the world’s largest brands and was later acquired by WPP, where he served as President of a firm operating in 25 countries with almost 3,000 employees. Mitch is the bestselling author of Six Pixels of Separation and CTRL ALT Delete, and the host of Thinking With Mitch Joel, one of the longest-running business podcasts in the world. His writing and commentary appear in outlets including Harvard Business Review, Fast Company and Inc. Magazine. He is a member of Dr. Marshall Goldsmith’s 100 Coaches and was named to the Thinkers50 Radar. Mitch also hosts Groove – The No Treble Podcast, documenting the oral history of electric bass players. Mitch is also Co-Founder of ThinkersOne, a platform that enables companies to bring personalized thought leadership from world-class experts into meetings, events and off-sites in focused 15-minute bursts.