An excerpt from Geoffrey Miller’s Spent: Sex, Evolution, and Consumer Behavior:
“I started to realize that marketing underlies everything in human culture in the same way that evolution underlies everything in human nature.”
Obviously a very relevant realization for our little weblog here. And a fun, insightful read so far.
Posted in His Nurture Posts | Tags: consumer behavior, evolutionary psychology, marketing
I’ve been a little quiet here lately. This is because most of my attention has been directed at DNA Exchange, the recently launched group genetic counseling blog. I am really, really excited about this initiative and the response from the genetic counseling community so far has been fantastic. We have a great group of contributors, with diverse opinions and interests, as well as a couple of guest bloggers lined up. It has been a fair amount of work with some unexpected challenges and dilemmas, but overall it is well worth it.
For the next little while, as I figure out how to balance hNhN, DNA Exchange and studying for board exams, my posts might be fewer and farther between. If any prolific bloggers want to send some tips my way, I’m all ears.
Posted in Her Nature Posts
If you read this blog on occasion, chances are you have read me ramble on human companies. With so much interesting thinking on this subject, I want to try to collect some good soundbites here. Please feel free to share your own submissions as I think I’ll continue to update this post. For now, though, here are 8 reasons why human companies are winning today:
1. People are more conscious than companies
‘Brands will be built on cultural and social missions, not commercial propositions. What actually matters to people is having a point of view on the world, a cultural mission to rally around.’ (Kay)
‘What would your brand do if diagnosed with just one year to live?’ (King)
2. People are more generous than companies
‘Until brands push past messaging and start more consistently providing people with ideas, emotions, actions [and utility], they should expect the consumer to avoid eye contact and walk right by’ (King)
Tom is a generous human
3. People have better stories than companies
Whereas corporate communications typically come in sporadic, repetitive campaigns, we tend to prefer ongoing stories with depth and complexity. People’s stories are more coherent and compelling – they’re made up of related smaller accounts that form an evolving narrative. (Isakson, Grant, Kay)
‘Brands live in a cultural space, and culture is far richer, deeper, complex and nuanced than 99.9% of marketing. Therefore, marketing will be more culturally interesting if it is made up of lots of coherent ideas vs consistently repeating one idea.’ (Kay)
‘If you are going to invite yourself into someone’s living room you have a duty not to shout at them or bore them or insult their intelligence. On the other hand, if you are a charming guest and you entertain them or amuse them or tell them something interesting, then they may like you a bit better and then they may be more inclined to invite you over again. (Fedwick)
4. People are smaller than companies
‘We used to rely on the security of big companies. That’s why we worked for them. And hired them. And put our money in them. But with the recent collapse all that’s changed. Now it’s a risk to do business with the big ones. We simply don’t trust companies anymore. We trust people. Small is the new big. Sustainable is the new growth. Trust is the new competitive advantage.’ (Bregman)
5. People are more accountable than companies
Sincerity and accountability are crucial when facing tough times:
“I know that many tears were shed today, both by laid-off and non-laid-off employees alike. Given our family culture, our layoffs are much tougher emotionally than they would be at many other companies. I’ve been asked by some employees whether it’s okay to twitter about what’s going on. Our Twitter policy remains the same as it’s always been: just be real, and use your best judgement.” – Tony Hsieh of Zappos
JetBlue
Maple Leaf Foods
6. People are nicer than companies
Companies are not social. Companies are commercial. They have explicitly commercial objectives… This is possibly why companies find it so hard to act socially and, by extension, in social media. They have to act without any thought to immediate financial return. (Yakob)
Frank is a real, caring, person from Comcast
7. People are quicker than companies
It’s hard for big companies (and agencies) to compete with the speed of inspired individuals. It’s hard to be nimble. It’s scary to launch and learn. It takes a lot of constant monitoring and hands on responding. (Gaffney)
Tiger Fan Commercial
8. People are more foolish than companies
‘Without a few scatterbrains on the payroll, innovation would never happen. New ideas come from divergent thinking, not convergent thinking.’ (Neumeier)
‘The new kinds of successful mass brand do what luxury brands have done previously: give you little bits of magic that nobody will probably ever see.’ (Earls)
Posted in His Nurture Posts
Via Take Your Customer To Work Day
As the stories continue to roll in from Thursday all reports indicate year one was a success! A big thanks to everyone involved for taking a chance and letting your customers in. Of particular interest for me is the range of ways people have executed this concept. Much of the hesitation from potential participants came from people who were just not sure what to make of the idea — uncertain how it could work for their group. So it’s awesome to see how some parties got creative given their circumstances.
A few examples of the different approaches: the Museum of Life + Science took members behind the scenes of exhibits, Steam Whistle Brewery held an “employee for a day” contest, and Vicki at ThreeWheels gave us a virtual tour of her home office (we heard a lot of “I’d love to participate, but I work from home”). As I mentioned leading up to the day, ‘there was no specific right way to Take Your Customer To Work – what was important was giving customers a behind the scenes glimpse of what you do’. I think it’s safe to say all our participants met this objective, and had some fun along the way! Stay tuned for more updates as I receive them.
Exhibit Tech, Peter, shows Museum of Life + Science members a (top secret) prototype of an idea he has for a new exhibit opening this summer.
Cause for concern?
I read a lot about direct-to-consumer genetic testing, and there is little that I read these days that catches me by surprise. So, when I read that 23andMe started selling their services in Southern California outpatient health centers, I didn’t really blink an eye. Until I read this:
Those who purchase the service at these facilities will also receive a 30-minute educational session with a PPH nurse, who will answer questions about genetic testing using educational materials developed by 23andMe. Referrals are provided to genetic counselors, but the education session is not genetic counseling.”
I guess I appreciate that 23andMe made the effort to explicitly state that they are not providing genetic counseling services. But it seems to me that they are going to great lengths not to provide genetic counseling. This system implies that the education piece can be done completely separately from the counseling piece.
I see a fundamental difference between not providing genetic counseling to an online customer vs. putting a customer face-to-face with a healthcare provider and deliberately not providing any counseling. More on this difference later. For now, I’d be interested to sit in on one of these educational sessions. Do the nurses have any additional training in genetics? Is there a protocol for identifying those patients who would benefit from a referral to a genetic counselor? Are online customers ever provided an option for a referral to a genetic counselor? Anyone who can provide clarification, it would be greatly appreciated.
Posted in Her Nature Posts
Cross-promotion via Take Your Customer To Work Day
—
So we’re under three weeks away from the big day, and I just wanted to give a couple brief updates:
The Museum of Life and Science is on board, which really excites me. Museums have the potential to offer such a compelling behind the scenes glimpse, so hopefully we can get some photo/ video coverage of the day. Many thanks to Beck Tench, their Director of Web Experience, for her interest in the project. The NCLMS has a great reputation for their hands-on experience, and their site nicely aligns. Next time your near Durham, NC, be sure to pay a visit. I know I will.
Jackie Huba of Church of the Customer and the Society for Word of Mouth (SWOM) has been nice enough to feature Take Your Customer To Work Day on SWOM. If you don’t know it, SWOM is a social network that ‘helps people build word of mouth into the DNA of their organizations using social media.’ I think they’re a natural partner, as both our concepts attempt to link on-line values with off-line interaction for better customer engagement. And just on a personal note, it’s awesome to get some support from a long-time customer champion I have much respect for.As for updates on other participants, I’m waiting on details from a few, and still working to confirm some other promising leads. As always, if you know of an organization that might want to partake - please let us know. Otherwise, stay tuned – the news is going to start coming a little more quickly now as we near May 28th.
Posted in His Nurture Posts
Posted in His Nurture Posts | Tags: advertising, brand, heritage, human companies
Last week I gave a presentation to a group of genetic counsellors entitled “Health 2.0: What it is, and why we should know about it.” My hope was to generate some interest among GCs in becoming more engaged with the online community, be it patients, other health professionals or researchers. Thought I would take this concept a step further here.
FIVE REASONS GCs SHOULD BLOG
I am happy to report that very soon a GC-authored group blog will be a reality! Thanks to some hard-working like-minded colleagues, the blog will be up and running soon. Please give me a shout if you’re interested in getting involved. Otherwise, stay tuned…
Posted in Her Nature Posts | Tags: blog, commuication, community, development, GC, genetic counsellor, genetic counselor, online engaged, patient
Building Brands With A Fix
Today Seth Godin re-posted his classic customer experience presentation This Is Broken (watch it now if you haven’t) and reminded us that sadly little progress has been made. What strikes me when you hear his 7 points again are how many are service specific. I guess it’s easier to fix products than people.
A while back I read an interesting post from Richard Branson on Virgin. He states that ‘of the Top 20 brands in the world, Virgin is the only one that does not play in a well-defined trade’ (i.e. Nike in athletics, Microsoft in computers). Virgin, rather, is a $5B way of life brand that aims to make people happier across a range of business activities, including airlines, trains, holidays, mobile phones, media, financial services and healthcare. As Branson says this “really gets up the noses of people who think they know ‘the rules of business’ (whatever they are).”
In an article last week from the economist, Zappos’ Tony Hsieh spoke of how he admired the Virgin Group’s exceptional growth model, and might one day take Zappos down a similar path:
From its origins as an online shoe-retailer founded in 1999, the company has expanded into selling clothes, consumer electronics and other items. Last year it rang up a record $1 billion in sales even as other retailers were struggling. Mr Hsieh muses out loud about the possibility that Zappos might one day enter the hotel or airline industries, perhaps in the offline world.
He reckons Zappos can cultivate a reputation for outstanding customer service to the point where it, too, can become a springboard into several markets. He once described Zappos as “a service company that just happens to sell shoes”.
What all this says to me is that in this fragmented, small brand, value-based market, there is still a role for larger companies that stand for consumer trust. But trust today is less about product quality than ever (because pretty good is price of entry). Instead, companies like Virgin and Zappos will succeed because they offer an exceptional service fix.
Posted in His Nurture Posts | Tags: customer experience, customer service, quality, this is broken, zappos
I read an interesting article by Dr. Roni Zeiger about the importance of asking your doctor to outline all of the risks and benefits of any treatment or procedure prior to consenting to it.
In his own words
Your job as an informed consumer of healthcare is to make sure that the
benefits outweigh the risks. The stakes are too high for you to assume
that your doctor knows this…Demand the facts and make informed decisions. Your life depends on it.
I posted a comment on the article directly, but thought I would elaborate a little bit here. I think this argument particularly interesting in the context of a genetic counselling session. Part of my job is to outline the benefits (such as providing valuable information for family members) and the risks (such as the potential for future insurance discrimination) of pursuing a genetic test. After reviewing the risks and benefits, we will ask the patient if he/she would like to proceed. I have always personally felt this to be a strength of my profession. Based on Dr. Zeiger’s argument above, we are ahead of the game.
However, I occasionally get the sense that people are confused by this process because it goes against the general flow of most other medical appointments. Also, there are some people who would prefer not to hear any of the risks, benefits and limitations of the test. Instead, they are only interested in hearing what we think they should do.
I don’t think there is any right or wrong way to be a patient. But if you align yourself with the patient empowerment camp, you’ll find like-minded healthcare providers in your genetics clinic. If you’d rather not hear the details, it could be a frustrating experience for you.
Posted in Her Nature Posts | Tags: benefits, empowerment, genetics, patient, risks, Zeiger
