Innovation Reactor

Online Customer Experience Innovation: Creating Community

Nowadays your customers are more likely to trust a complete stranger’s product review, because they prefer to know what other people think rather than being shown “branded” marketing messages. By developing an online community where customers create the content, share information and interact, your company can deepen customer engagement and influence the purchase decision.

In a recent blog post Chris Brogan says “communities empower users of products or services, or people with like-minded interests to interact”. The idea is to create a customer-centric social network and community tools on your company website. Since this will empower customers to make informed purchase decisions and differentiate your brand in the marketplace. Below are some ideas for creating online communities.

Customer ratings and reviews ~ companies like eBay, Amazon, Zappos and Expedia use detailed seller ratings and testimonials to improve customer information, increase product relevance and build trust. Since consumers naturally follow the crowd and like understanding the selections and preferences of others, try creating a simple customer ratings system for your products and allow space for customers to write a review. This will engage power shoppers who read reviews and ultimately spend more online.

Email-a-friend ~ provide the ability for your customers to send their favorite products or your special offers to friends and family.

Member-to-member news ~ allow members of your community to post notices to other members.

Member content ~ let customers post video, fan mail, product usage or travel tips by creating a customer discussion board or user forum.

Connect to social networking sites ~ allow customers to share the content with others via feeds to Facebook, MySpace, Linked-in, StumbleUpon or Digg.

Company blog or Twitter feed ~ let customers follow your latest news and keep up-to-date with new products, developments or special offers.

By creating an online community and allowing customers to share valuable product insights with one another you can significantly influence the buying decision process, create engagement with your brand and deepen the online customer experience.

Related Links:
Audience or Community

Let your customers design your next product

Companies invest millions in consumer research with the aim of developing new products and bringing them to market. Some companies are becoming smarter and reducing research costs, by using the web to engage in dialogue with customers then using the information gained to create new ideas for products and services.

Starbucks www.mystarbucksidea.com lets you share, post and comment on new Starbucks related ideas. Anything from their used cup recycling policy to feedback on the taste of the new Pike Place Roast. Since many consumers visit social networking sites and read posts but don’t have time to comment, Starbucks lets you vote on the ideas already posted so people then have a fast mechanism to either agree or disagree with what’s being said. This is a great way for Starbucks to collect quantitative data to understand consumer sentiment and pinpoint trends.

Dell created IdeaStorm www.dellideastorm.com an online community that allows customers to share ideas and collaborate with one another. Over 9000 ideas for new products and existing product improvements have been posted –sparking conversations between users. Dell then feeds the data back to their designers, engineers and programmers to bring the best customer ideas to life. Dell creates a great 3-way dialogue, by allowing employees to join the conversation, so they can provide tips, training or just a thank you for any new ideas.

Lego, the Danish toy company has a great site for kids www.lego.com/factory where they can design, share and buy their own customized Lego models. Kids can post their designs onto the site, share them and rate others creations. This helps Lego gain deeper insights into their target audience and from hundreds of postings has now launched 3 new products designed by actual fans.

Companies can also collect data on customer preferences and feed this into their new product development and ideation process. Dominoes Pizza www.dominoes.com lets customers create their own pizza from a list of toppings, crusts and sizes. Through the Nike website www.nikeid.com customers can design and customize their own shoes, gear and apparel – choosing styles, colours and personalization elements. Capital One www.capitalone.com lets customers build their own credit card from a choice of interest rates, rewards programs and graphics.

 

How is your company using the web and social networking to gather customer feedback, generate new product ideas and collect data on customer preferences to identify the latest trends?