Current Topic Report Idea - Exploring Social Business and Online Communities

For my Customer Insights course we have been asked to “identify an area of research related to customer insights or experiences that seems particularly important for [our] professional use”. For some time now, I have been increasingly interested in the online customer experience on company owned websites. I would like my paper to fall somewhere within this VERY large umbrella topic. There are many ways I could take this paper so I will need to flesh through some of the different options before narrowing things down. 

I have always been an “early adopter” of online technologies which is probably due in large part to my strong interest in human behavior and experiences, and how the internet has brought this to a new level. I enjoy learning about how current advancements in technology are transforming consumer behavior and marketing practices. I am fascinated by what can be learned by the plethora of data being created on the internet daily and sometimes alarmed to find that many companies don’t know where to begin when parsing through this data. I also am quite interested in how the layout and design of a website can make or break a customer experience. There are so many points along the customer journey where a customer can be lost, but when used properly the internet can help keep customers moving down the sales funnel. 

In my last role at National Instruments, I managed NI’s customer-facing online community. I drove the strategy for platform development while always keeping a focus on the customer experience. The goal of most of my projects was to gain deeper customer insights, grow brand awareness, increase customer loyalty and advocacy, ensure customer success, and drive new and repeat sales. This role was both exciting and challenging as it dealt with an area of business that is rapidly developing and thus required me to define new strategies on a regular basis- there was a lot of trial and error! I found that research in this area and best practices were still being defined, which made it difficult when designing a business strategy around involving the “social space”. 

I would like to analyze the available literature on this topic and read blogs/books/articles on online innovation, social media, Internet marketing, and social collaboration. Some topics I am interested in exploring are:

• How companies can leverage online social business practices to meet their corporate goals
• Understanding your customer and their online behavior.
• When does it make sense for a company to be “social” (would look at Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, but also owned platforms like Customer Communities/Forums).
• The benefits and drawbacks of online discussion forums and online communities.
• Best practices for running a successful customer community. 

I see this paper covering both the gathering and identification of customer insights, as well as designing valuable customer experiences. 

Some articles and scholars I will look at are:

• Jeremiah Owyang (http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/ ) I have been very impressed with the work and research performance by Jeremiah over the last two years. I had the opportunity to learn more about him and his work last year at SXSWi and I believe he has many articles that give a thorough look at the social business world.
• I also was able to attend the Dachis Social Business Summit last year and felt a lot of valuable content was presented. I have access to the slides/content from last year’s event and will also try to look at the information from this year’s event. (http://www.slideshare.net/dachisgroup/)
• Another conference I attended was Jive World- which also provided valuable best practices and analysis of how companies can use online communities.
• Managing Brands and Customer Engagement in Online Brand Communities (http://bschool.nus.edu.sg/Marketing/Jochen%20papers/WirtzetalJOSM2013OnlineBrandCommunities.pdf)
• Social media competitive analysis and text mining: A case study in the pizza industry (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0268401213000030)

As mentioned before, this is an area where there are a still a lot of unknowns. My plan to select a focus area and then reference scholars, articles, and best practices from companies who are already implemented a strong social business platform. 

Generative Research Design

1. What I "can't" live without and what matters to me...

Well I must admit this was harder than I expected. I went through multiple variations before I ended on what you see above. Prompt: identify the "stuff" you can not live without, seems easy enough, until I really began to think about it deeply. I love my cellphone- anyone who has seen me walk around McCombs could tell you that. It rarely leaves my side (even when I am asleep). But is it the physical iphone that I love so dearly? No. I'm pretty active on Facebook and Instagram, but if they were gone tomorrow would my world collapse? Nope.

These items and technologies are just a means to an end. What I can't live without is my faith, my family, my friends, and the ability to remain connected with these things. On top of that, I have developed a deep, deep love for good ‘ole Texas (specifically Austin): the people, the weather, the summer heat, the big blue skies, the lakes, the green belt, the good, the bad, and the ugly…ALL OF IT.

Outside of that, what I care about is having a place to call home, good food and good drinks, living in a walkable, open, friendly, cute neighborhood (LOVE Clarksville), and music. A place to call home: I have moved around for much of my life, I have lived in DC, Chicago, Boston, Austin, Dallas, Nashville, Toronto, Sydney, and I finally ended back up in Austin. I have lived in 19 homes and attended 9 different school. You would think I would be comfortable with change and travel, and yet I am the biggest homebody you will meet. "Home" isn't the house I grew up in, it's the place where my family comes together, relaxes, laughs, and enjoys each other's company. Right now that is my parent's house in Dallas, but I've been "home" when on vacation with my family as well. "Home is where the heart is"- so cliche and so true.

Music calms my soul, which is good, because I can get pretty worked up and stressed. I love music that makes me want to sing, that gives me energy, that makes me feel at peace. I LOVE listening to someone play the guitar around a campfire. I didn't grow up playing musical instruments but I learned to play the piano by ear and at the beginning of this school year I bought a guitar and have been teaching myself to play. I am not good, but it does something to me that nothing else does, and so I keep practicing and playing. My mind is always all over the place, I can rarely turn it off, but I have found that music, singing, and playing piano/guitar allows me to zone out the rest of the world for just a second.

2. Digital Ecosystem...

I receive the majoring of my news, information, updates, etc from facebook, google news/web search (which compiles information from various online new sources), and via communications with my family and friends through email, text, etc. After that I do look at the occasional blog, tv broadcast website, newspaper online, video, etc. But for everything outside of email, texting, facebook, and google news/web search I almost rarely would go straight to that online source. I typically end up there due to a search, or a link someone sent me.

Life is so busy, and I usually only have a few minutes here and there to catch up on news and updates. I know that my family/friends will inform me if something major has happened, Facebook will usually be buzzing, plus I follow local news channels on facebook which allows me to follow the news. Additionally, which a quick look at Google news, I can get a pretty good idea of what is going on around me. It isn't perfect- I know that, and it is most likely bias, but in my opinion it is better than nothing! I use my cell phone and computer to access most of these things.

3. Typical Weekday (Went with Tuesday)

I had the hardest time with this one, simply because each day is so different for me and I feel like I am constantly accessing information/content. Technology has really made it possible to access almost anything at any time as long as you have the right device (phone, computer, car radio, etc). I don't really have a routine for when I access the majority of information and content I consume in a day. 

Times that I access content most: Right when I wake up and right before I go to sleep are two times that I regularly consume content (via my phone and sometimes my computer). 

Times that I access content less: during class, meetings, church, driving, meals (unless eating alone), sleeping, etc.