Crowd-sourcing: Be Careful What you Wish For

The recent uproar surrounding the introduction – and then demise – of Gap’s new logo has sparked vibrant discussion on the merits and risks of crowd-sourcing…or more specifically listening to customers and critics.

A few weeks ago, Gap introduced a new logo on their Facebook page with nary a peep of warning or consultation. The initial reaction among observers was swift and fairly uniform – harsh criticism. The Gap folks tried to address the situation with a belated invitation for consumer input – call it reactive crowd-sourcing – which only fanned the flames of critics and confused observers. Think of it as bad buzz. Subsequent updates by Gap positioned the new logo as a broader brand update, and provided more background on the rationale and strategy. But in a fascinating twist, a survey several days after the initial buzz confirmed that few consumers were aware of the new brand or related online polemic. Gap ultimately announced they heard the feedback and scrapped the new logo design; it appears they have learned their lesson and will tread carefully in future brand changes. (For another example of a rebranding effort gone wrong – witness the debacle by Tropicana, which surprised consumers with a new packaging look that was harshly criticized – and eventually scrapped.)

There are several lessons communication and marketing pros can take from this story:

• If you are truly committed to listen to online consumers or fans – have a crowd-sourcing plan and a system to back it up. Confirm how you will gather feedback and what you will do with it before opening the doors to input and ideas. Define rules of the game to manage expectations and legal/copyright issues. Most important, be prepared to respond and take action based on what you hear.
• Make listening and monitoring of relevant sites a constant activity rather than an ad-hoc, reactive event. That will provide solid context for dissecting the scope and potential impact of any feedback.
• Consider getting input before you make any changes to products or brands. That makes the process more credible and relevant for consumers.
• Know who/where your fans and customers are…and make sure you are always listening to them. There was interesting debate around the Gap issue about whether the logo uproar was truly a broad, grass-roots reaction from fans and customers or just a brush fire from a small but vocal group of malcontents in the design community.
• Have a brand strategy – and stick to it. Yes…consumers own the brand, since their perceptions are ultimately the reality and determine brand equity. And many passionate fans feel they have personal ownership of favored products or brands. But no brand can survive without careful management by inside folks who are trying to blend identity, marketing, products and PR to drive the business.

I’ve heard a few executives and peers whisper that the Gap episode provides further evidence that social media is risky and perhaps even counterproductive. I disagree. The problem here wasn’t with social media – though listening and dialogue has exploded with the advent of new technology – but with faulty strategy and planning. The famous Coke Classic fiasco happened years ago without the prominent presence of Facebook or blogs. The issue now is that criticism can spread much wider and faster than years ago…which puts more onus on active monitoring, smart planning and ongoing dialogue with customers. An excellent article in AdAge focusing on social media “screw-ups” (which goes beyond crowd-sourcing) suggests that such missteps are inevitable – despite increasing efforts by companies to listen and learn – due to the rapid pace of evolution in communication technology.

On a final note, I enjoyed this video post by my friend Paul Walker at the PulsePoint Group on crowd-sourcing projects that worked well…and why they did. It reminds us of the potential benefits of crowd-sourcing – including consumer/employee engagement, lower cost, innovation and speed-to-market – which to my mind greatly outweigh the risks. Check it out.

Employees Increasingly Working Around IT

An article in a recent HBR provides more evidence that employees are increasingly using external technology to support their work-related activities. More specifically, many information workers are using consumer technologies – whether they be social, mobile or cloud – to help solve their business and customer problems. A recent survey of 4,000 information workers in the U.S. found that almost 40% are using do-it-yourself technologies without IT’s permission. The author calls this the consumerization of IT, or technology populism.

This trend is an open secret in most companies – staff with rogue iPhones or iPads that aren’t “supported” by IT; teams using Skype or personal smartphones to conduct video calls; peer conversations occurring on networks like Facebook or Twitter; project collaboration on Google Docs and DropBox; recruitment through sites like LinkedIn…the list goes on. Watching the cat and mouse game is almost comical, though it often leads to frustration on all sides. The reasons for the tech workarounds are varied, but the ultimate rationale is that the newer technology works…and it’s often free and easy to use. Most staff want to do their jobs as efficiently as possible, and with IT often lagging or putting up roadblocks to many innovations, employees are increasingly going outside the firewall for solutions.

The interesting conversation is whether this development is positive – for customers, for employees and for CIOs? The author Ted Shadler suggests that well-intentioned, covert innovators can be very beneficial to the business. But he admits self-serve solutions can create chaos and risk for organizations: It’s all well and good to have employees solving customer problems. But chaos and rogue behavior is not okay. To identify the employee initiatives that are worth pursuing and figure out how to make them safe and enterprise-grade, your IT organization needs to get involved. Shadler says the solution is a new compact between employees, managers and IT where give-and-take replaces turf wars and inertia: Employees need to step up and behave responsibly (which means HR needs to be involved). Business managers need to roll up their sleeves and learn enough about the technology to understand the potential risks. (Managers also need to encourage and reward experimentation.) IT needs to assess and mitigate technology risk. And that means IT staff need to be much closer to business employees and activities so that they can help with technology platforms.

The point I take from this is that trying to stop employees from using innovative technology is a losing battle – even within firewalls. In the face of this trend, IT needs to take the initiative and find workable solutions that balance staff preferences, corporate priorities and IT risk policies. The cost of inaction is not just a lost opportunity to improve business efficiency and customer service, but a corrosive impact on employee morale and engagement.

Is the Web Really Dead?

A recent edition of Fast Company featured a provocative cover story suggesting the Web was heading the way of dinosaurs. I’m not particularly savvy on the technical side so I’m fuzzy on one of the critical distinctions made in the article (the internet being distinct from the Web) but the key point I took from the piece is that the browser has become increasingly irrelevant to the Web experience. The explosion of content delivered through apps, cloud programs and semi-closed or private networks has created an internet experience that is fluid and incredibly diverse. This means not only that the browser has lost relevance, but that we access the internet through a range of mobile, interchangeable devices. The critical lesson, according to the article, is that users will migrate to tools and technology that simply work, reliably and simply.

There was predictable churn about the article – with some saying it was hyperbole (check out this Ragan video interview of NYT writer David Pogue calling the Web demise claim “nonsense) and others that it missed the mark on intranet growth or was weakened by contradictions. More than one comment, in fact, mentioned the irony that much of the debate on the article was taking place on the Web. To Fast Company’s credit, it included contrarian commentaries alongside the cover story.

My favorite take on the argument was a thoughtful analysis by Steve Lohr in the New York Times that shifts the discussion away from the cycle of overblown technology predictions (of imminent demise) and proclamations (about the “next big things”.)  As Lohr puts it, evolution – not extinction – has always been the primary rule of media ecology. Most providers and platforms adapt and survive, and that is not cause for alarm. Lohr’s second key point is that a characteristic of evolution in the Web 2.0 environment is the accelerated pace of change and innovation. The result, he posits, is a proliferation of digital media forms and fast-shifting patters of media consumption.

Once again, I take the discussion back to the central question for me – what does this mean to professional communicators and their clients? The most obvious implication is that failure to remain informed – at minimum – and strategically nimble and innovative – as the ideal – is a ticket to irrelevance. Lazy, static tactical recommendations that may have had a shelf-life years ago now lose their potency within months. Given the pace of evolution in the technology that drives communication, PR staff need to remain educated about trends and tools to provide relevant counsel and support. No need to be on the cutting edge or a tech wizard, but there’s no excuse for being less informed than the average corporate client. Professionals need to have a basic understanding of the new tools and platforms – and the related benefits and implications.

What’s interesting about all these changes is that the fundamental objectives and best practices of communication remain relatively constant – I don’t hear much of a debate about the sustained importance of leadership credibility, audience segmentation, manager outreach or two-way communication.  What is changing is the toolkit at our disposal. That dynamic presents an exciting opportunity – there’s a real charge in working in a business which is reinventing itself – but also a constant challenge.