Patrick Gregston: “Put VRM on your watch list.”
Thank You, Typepad
The nice folks at TypePad had some very nice things to say, and featured this blog as their “Blog of the Day.” Thanks, y’all!
“Featured Typepad Blog:
The Social Customer ManifestoChristopher Carfi is the CEO of Cerado and he’s looking out for customers, and not just his own. He’s interested in the technology and trends that are turning customers into marketers and putting them on the front line between businesses and potential new customers. His site, the Social Customer Manifesto, offers a simple list of customer desires — from "I want to do business with companies that act in a transparent and ethical manner" to (my personal favorite) "I don’t want to do business with idiots." Indeed, if Carfi’s manifesto were to become the expected baseline for business in the 21st century, the consumer world would certainly be a much, much better place. And Carfi knows that it won’t be easy. He spends a lot of time posting about the victories and setbacks for like-minded customers and the smart businesses that are courting them. So if you’re a business blogger looking for smart talk or a fed-up consumer looking for a sympathetic ear, take a minute to read the manifesto. It just might change your outlook.”
Thanks, SixApart. You’re too kind.
Sticking With The iPhone
David Wallace, the Lifekludger, asks:
“Is the ‘multi-touch’ screen dependent on using an actual human finger to ‘touch’ it? Will my mouthstick work the ‘multi-touch’ or a pen, or a plastic stick…? Is it a ‘multi’ touch display in terms of ‘multiple ways’ of touching or merely ‘multiple finger’ touch?
Did anyone at Apple actually think of people who don’t have full use of their fingers? I truly hope so.
Anyone at Apple listening? Want someone whose fingers don’t work to test it for you?”
O black-turtleneck-sweatered one, are you listening?
Mine…Mine…Mine…Mine…
One of the core tenets of the emerging notion of VRM is that we, the customers née users, should be in control of our own information. That is, we should decide what we tell to whom, under what circumstances. Additionally, we should be able to hold onto our own info (and, if a third party needs to hold onto our info on our behalf, we should be able to export it and move it elsewhere, easily).
Mike at Techdirt points to an article about how to create a personal health record (PHR) that gets to this idea in, of all places, the slow-to-change U.S. healthcare industry.
From an abstract, theoretical perspective, the PHR idea makes perfect sense. However, there are so many aspects of this that (I think) would be hobbled by the notoriously risk-averse healthcare industry. In particular, a number of questions come to mind, including:
- Will doctors accept the information in a patient’s PHR at face value, or need to re-run all test results to “cover themselves” for liability reasons anyway?
- What are the implications if someone gets ahold of my PHR? For example, can the information in my PHR be used to discriminate via insurance premiums?
- What if an unauthorized third party gets ahold of my PHR? What are the consequences of the theft of one’s medical history?
- More broadly, how does one select which portions of a PHR to share with which caregivers? Do I want everyone to have access to everything? (I think the answer is “no.”)
Anyone out there experimented with this at all? If so, would love to hear your stories.
You’re The Man Now, Dog!
Take three things:
- An image file
- A short sound clip
- A line of text
Put them all together. Shaken, not stirred.
What you have is You’re The Man Now, Dog!, a great example of co-creation. (The name of the site comes from the Sean Connery line here.) From the site:
YTMND, an acronym for “You’re The Man Now, Dog!”, is a website community that centers around the creation of YTMNDs, which are pages featuring a juxtaposition of a single image, optionally animated or tiled, along with large zooming text and a looping sound file. YTMND is also the general term used to describe any such site.
That’s what it is. Here’s why it is:
“YTMND is a site created for the purpose of furthering the creativity of its users. It stems from an idea that, using sound, and image, and some text, the users can convey a point, funny, political, or otherwise, to the general media.”
Simple. And spot-on.
Bonus link: Axl Rose meets Finding Nemo (yes, you read that correctly)
That Customer Was PWND!
Andrew Boyd nails what’s wrong with the current vendor-centric view of customers and CRM, and accurately describes the sorry state of the viewpoint of many organizations. Andrew:
“Leads are owned by marketing, prospects are owned by sales and customers are owned by accounting — unless there is a problem and then they are owned by support, or unless the company is trying to sell them more stuff, then it is sales or marketing again.”
‘Zactly.
By the way, there is a phenomenal conversation going on at the CRM2.0 wiki, which was set up by colleague and CRMGuru Paul Greenberg. Check it out.
Social Networking Comes To Healthcare
Was just sent a pointer to a solid article from the Wall Street Journal, “Social Networking Comes To Healthcare.” The key ‘graph:
“The social-networking revolution is coming to health care, at the same time that new Internet technologies and software programs are making it easier than ever for consumers to find timely, personalized health information online. Patients who once connected mainly through email discussion groups and chat rooms are building more sophisticated virtual communities that enable them to share information about treatment and coping and build a personal network of friends.”
Interestingly, most of the social networking connections cited were of the patient-to-patient variety, with minimal mention of the patient-provider relationship. That is a definite opportunity area.
(Hat Tip: Charles Donovan)
iPhone? Forget It…Introducing the ZunePhone!
How To Visualize Visualization
Very nice visualization from the folks at visual-literacy.org. Click on the graphic to go to the full-screen version, which contains roll-over examples of 100 different ways to get your point across and communicate more clearly. (hat tip: seth)
Bonus links: Visual Thinking School and Communication Nation
TypePad Menus (And Getting Rid Of That Annoying Border)
Have been doing some development work for a business blogging customer of ours, and again need to send out mad props (that’s what the kids these days say, right?) to John T. Unger and his Typepad Hacks site. A treasure trove!
One very useful bit…putting in active menus into the header. Here’s how to do it:
And other thing…want to get rid of that annoying border around your TypePad blog’s header? One way to do it is to make the “background” of the header graphic a complementary color to the header graphic, like this. However, John pointed out a little trick that can just make the border simply go away. In the Design tab of your blog, you will see a link that says “Edit Custom CSS” (n.b. it looks like you need to be a Pro member to do this). In the Custom CSS frame, simply put this little chunk of code (“edit the height attribute and the background-image: url, of course,” John adds):
/* banner image */
#banner
{
height: 110px;
background-image:
url(“http://johntunger.typepad.com/typepadhacks/Typepadhackslogo.gif”);
background-position: 0px 0px;
background-repeat: no-repeat;
text-align: left;
}
Poof! Border-be-gone.
Gracias, hermano!
