Social Networking Capitalist

Guest Post by Jay Deragon
Relationship Economy Thought Leader

I found this in my Facebook inbox today. I decided it was high time I posted something from Jay Deragon, one of my favorite leading thinkers on all things Relationship 2.0….Enjoy~

A strategy is a plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal. Strategy is different from tactics.

Every business, whether planned or not, has and acts on a strategy to both engage in market opportunities and to provide offerings. The process and thinking about strategy has changed overtime as the market conditions change.

When market conditions change such changes can turn old strategies on their head and subsequently a business finds that what they were doing in the past is no longer valid and they begin to lose market share.

Are The Market Conditions Changing?

Have you watched the headlines? Everywhere we turn we can see market disruption. This is especially true within the field of media, the advertising field, our entire economic market has changed and in case you haven’t noticed the market of conversations is fueling disruption in every market. For companies to adapt to these changes they must pursue alternative strategies. However the pursuit of alternative strategies means that everything changes including how your new strategy is formed.

Strategy 2.0 is a new process that is required to create new plans of action in order to stay in the game and thrive. The marketplace is at war for consumer attention and spending. The war is not fought with traditional tactics rather it is fought using methods of engaging markets, the conversation.

In his book, The Cluetrain Manifesto, (1999) Doc Searls speaks to the point that “markets are conversations.” He supports this thesis with a thorough discussion on how the growth and widespread use of the Internet is facilitating conversations that defy the traditional boundaries of corporations and countries. What was once a prophecy has now become a fact – and at an unprecedented rate of speed. This movement has not only influenced existing markets and how consumers engage in transactions, it has created new markets and new methods of exchange.

Searls notes that three things happen in all “natural” markets: transaction, conversation and relationship. The conventional thinking of almost all corporate cultures is that they understand transaction excessively – focusing intensely on the ultimate result: The “bottom line.” Thus, their understanding of the value of genuine conversations and healthy relationships is woefully deficient. Corporate America rationalizes almost all her decisions in terms of transactional value alone. This mindset will not continue to be successful in the new economy.

Cycles of Strategic Transformation

According to Doc Searls, the acceleration of conversations creates cycles of transformation. These cycles have blazed the trail to a new frontier for commerce: Relationship. The networked marketplace can only be improved upon and enlarged through relationships. Those who are grasping this recognize the opportunity to expand a current market and/or lead to the creation of a new one. How does this happen? It begins with a conversation.

Strategy 2.0 is about applying knowledge of this dynamic marketplace and implementing a plan to maximize your competitiveness in the marketplace of conversations. Strategy 2.0 is about anticipating the evolution of your intended strategy into an emerging strategy whose cycle of transformation doesn’t occur at a tidy annual corporate planning retreat; rather, it is an ongoing, everyday occurrence.

Strategy 2.0 doesn’t wait for quarterly and annual reports to be compiled; it is being discussed and formed among the daily conversations between employees and customers. But Strategy 2.0 is not only about the use of an advancing technology. Actually, it’s more basic than that. Strategy 2.0 begins and ends as a conversation. Get it?

What say you?

To get Jay in your own Facebook inbox, join the Link To Your World Group on Facebook.  Also check him out at  LinkToYourWorld.com

Technorati Tags cluetrain manifesto, doc searles, jay deragon, relationship economy, strategy 2.0

The OG Online Thought Leader Seth Godin talks at TED about Tribes (What I like to call True Fans - what if you had a Tribe of 1000 True Fans? Never “work” again because you would have your own economy!).

TED is my favorite site for learning who the leading thinkers are for today. Seth Godin is the Original Thinker and I read his blog updates FIRST in my inbox. Enjoy and EXPAND your thinking!

Technorati Tags Online Thought Leadership, seth godin, TED, thought leadership, Tribes

It’s about time somebody wrote this book. And, David Silver is the one to write it. I like it because it’s practical. David breaks down 18 revenue channels for online communities, and none of them are advertising. Interesting huh? Want to know what they are? Listen in to this interview and you will see. Better yet, grab a copy of the book for your library. It’s a keeper.

THE SOCIAL NETWORK BUSINESS PLAN: 18 Strategies That Will Create Great Wealth. (He’s got my attention

USA Today says, “If entrepreneurship is a religion, then Silver is its high priest.”>

In The Social Network Business Plan, social network expert, David Silver presents and explains 18 cutting-edge methods to create revenue for social network websites–none of which are advertising.

He also predicts the demise of seemingly successful online communities such as MySpace and Facebook that rely on advertising as non-sustainable modalities.

David says the future new products and services will be introduced, talked about, rated, reviewed and recommended - or killed - by online communities.

Listen in on The Business of Online Thought Leadership internet radio show

Technorati Tags Online Community Development

Do people who know how  NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming)  or hypnosis works have an unfair advantage  on Twitter & Facebook, among other social networks?

I think they DO.  (Ummm…I KNOW they do. Some of my best friends are master NLP and persuasion artists and they have LOTS of Twitter followers who do what-ever-they-tell-them-to-do ;-).

If there was anyone who would know for sure, it’s Richard Bandler.

You know, THAT Richard Bandler. The one considered the “Grandfather” of NLP. And a REALLY great hypnotist.

I was talking with a colleague and she happened to mention his new book, Richard Bandler’s Guide to Trance-Formation (she’s his publicist). I mentioned how fascinated I’ve always been with NLP and the ability to understand someone’s mental map and how they think. And how cool it would be to actually meet Richard Bandler.

What I told her I didn’t have was a simple explanation for what NLP actually is, and how it works.

I’ve read a lot of books that went into laborious details about it, gave all these long drawn out explanations on all of the terms, complete with illustrations of eyes looking up, looking down, looking left and down, looking right and up (reminding me of that rhyme we used to say in elementary school “Look UP, Look DOWN, Look at my THUMB, Gee You’re DUMB…LOL!).  I think they called them “accessing cues”…

All it did was make me dizzy and not want to think about it. So many unread pages….

So she sent me an email one day not long after and asked if I would be interested in interviewing him.  (umm..YES!!)

I got a copy of the book, and I must say that in the first 3 short chapters, I actually GOT what NLP is. Forever.

If you’re interested, it’s how we represent the world in our own mind - the map or model we create to make sense of and navigate around the world AND the distinct way we each process our experiences.

Does understanding how you process experience give someone an unfair advantage on Twitter when they want to persuade you to “click here” to “see”, or “listen” to or “download and read”?

Does knowing how to use certain words that are more hypnotic and trance-inducing than others make a difference in whether you actually take any action at all?

Good questions.  Listen to my interview on The Business of Online Thought Leadership Radio with Richard Bandler and hear what he has to say about social media, hypnosis, trance and NLP.

It’s right here:

Does Twitter Put You In A Trance? Dr. Richard Bandler tells you the truth

Technorati Tags facebook, hypnosis, michelle price, NLP, Online Thought Leadership, Richard Bandler, social media strategy, Twitter

A Twitter conversation sparked this post today, thanks @JDeragon

Jan Phillips wrote this white paper in 2006, using Michael Stelzner’s white paper on… “How to Write a White Paper”  (thanks Michael …designed to help market the book she was writing for 9th Element Group, our angel-funded, short-lived “business of thought leadership” consulting company.

You can download it RIGHT here:

 Visionary Thought Leadership. (PDF, opens new window, no registration required - coming from a die-hard information marketer no less!)

I think it’s time we revived it, let me know what you think when you read it,  it’s obvious to me now that we were probably ahead of our time (at the time ;-)).

Enjoy the read, and if you like it…
You’ll LOVE the award-winning book companion book we published titled “The Art of Original Thinking: The Making of a Thought Leader”
(Amazon.com and in bookstores too)

Also, go check out Jan Phillips and tell her what an amazing predictor she is… 
(well, I guess we all were ;-)).  You’ll love her site.  Tell her Michelle Price sent you.

Technorati Tags A Third Mind, jan phillips, jay deragon, michael stelzner, michelle price, thought leadership, thought leadership marketing, visionary leadership

Today on The Business of Online Thought Leadership talk radio, I snagged an interview with leading thinker Sandy Carter, IBM’s Hippest Marketing 2.0 Chick, and Vice President, SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) and WebSphere Marketing, Strategy, and Channels.

Sandy is also the new author of the book “The New Language of Marketing 2.0: How to Use ANGELS to Energize Your Market”. She is responsible for IBM’s cross-company, worldwide SOA initiatives and is in charge of one of IBM’s premier brands, IBM WebSphere.

She is known for her innovative Marketing 2.0;  she’s led the brand to win 14 industry marketing awards in the past year!

Listen in and learn what Big Blue is up to - how they are using the tools of Web 2.0 and social media to open and sustain conversations with their customers and prospects.  You’ll learn how they got over 50,000 customers to give them input on a new product, and how they used Twitter to increase the attendance at a series of Road Show LIVE events.  In fact, they attributed at least 5,000 attendees overall to Twitter!

Here you go, enjoy:
The New Language of Marketing: How to Use ANGELS to Energize Your Market

Technorati Tags ibm, Marketing 2.0, michelle price, Online Thought Leadership, Sandy Carter

I discovered TWO more online thought leaders today, both women. Rhonda “Shelley” Ellis and The Technology Goddess or TTG (and funny enough, that is the name that stuck for her for me). Shelley is the leading thinker on how to cash in with Google Adwords using “content targeting” (which the boyz usually run screaming away from) and TTG is just the coolest female I’ve seen online yet - she’s got the latest thinking on “content placement” and it’s NOT the usual suspects - ie article distribution, it goes MUCH MUCH deeper. She’s teamed up with one really smart dude too. Her site is where I found this video and just had to share it on A Third Mind so you can see the latest thinking of where the web is going.

“Jonathan Harris wants to make sense of the emotional world of the Web. With deep compassion for the human condition, his projects troll the Internet to find out what we’re all feeling and looking for.” The site mentioned in this video is We Feel Fine

Enjoy this TED Talk, it’s fascinating! And I’ll share more about these cool women later…(I’m going to be inviting them for an interview on The Business of Online Thought Leadership in 2009.)

 

Technorati Tags jonathan harris, new economy, Online Thought Leadership, shelley ellis, TED, the social web, the technology goddess

For some reason, I’ve always been fascinated with the topic of thought leadership. Maybe because I like to think a lot ;-).  

In fact, in 2005 I was a partner in a start-up consulting firm with 5 other dynamic women - we named our company 9th Element Group, (the ninth element is Flourine, it’s the most powerful element in the known universe and has been tested as rocket fuel…literally).  and we decided our niche was going to be The Business of Thought Leadership.  We would position, package and propel thought leaders into their marketplace! 

Part of the business of thought leadership is that you publish thought-provoking information. And we knew we’d need to write a book to be taken seriously. Luckily, one of the partners was an award-winning author, Jan Phillips. Jan wrote the book over the summer of 2005 (literally).  The Art of Original Thinking: The Making of a Thought Leader was published in 2006 and won awards.

Unfortunately, the company ran out of funding before we could really get traction so we all went off to other things.   

My intrique with the topic has remained, and in particular, I’m finding that there are a lot of women who demonstrate thought leadership with blogging, podcasting, social networking, social media and other areas - PR, business, technology…but aren’t necessarily recognized for their leading-edge thinking.

So I’m starting an internet talk radio show “The Business of Online Thought Leadership” and it’s going to profile many of the brave new entrepreneurs leading the field who you may not necessarily know but probably should.  

This week starts with my good friend Rob Schultz of www.AudaciousAudio.com and the reason I started with him is that he’s done some really cool innovative things with online media, like creating flash movies for big name coaches, and created a Larry King-style split screen interview using Skype and a web-cam (who knew? Traditional media is probably about to lose their MIND because of innovations like this ;-)…they can’t compete!)

Why Rob first? Well, when we reconnected recently, he happens to have just created the Online Radio Challenge - a 50 day program to creating your online radio show using Blog Talk Radio (how about that for timing?? The Universe is always at work, right?)

You can watch the split-screen program below:

You can listen to our first show here: The Business of Online Thought Leadership

And, I’ll be on the air every Wednesday at www.BlogTalkRadio.com/onlinethoughtleadership at high noon to inspire and empower you to build your online presence using social media and social networking, build your platform and get up close and personal with some of today’s most innovative thought leaders in social media.

Hope you can join me!

Technorati Tags blog talk radio, internet talk radio, michelle price, Online Thought Leadership, rob schultz, Social Networking

I decided to embed the live blog on my site too, we are officially simulcasting live from three different blogs - watch out CNN! - Next - off to go see if I can put it on my Facebook page…I’ll let you know…

Technorati Tags barack obama, dahna chandler, election 2008, michelle price, social media changed politics

I am trying out something new - “live blogging” - if you want to come join the fun, and learn how it works (or watch how it works is probably a better description meet me over at my colleague and fellow social media experimenter Dahna M. Chandler’s blog at 5 pm Pacific/8 pm Eastern.

Election 2008: How Social Media Changed This Election 

Last one there is a rotten egg…

O-BA-MA! Yes we can!