Dallas Lawrence is the chief global digital strategist for Burson-Marsteller. He writes about emerging media trends, online reputation management and digital issue advocacy. Connect with him on Twitter @dallaslawrence.
In our modern social media universe, where billions of tweets, likes, pins, video uploads and views occur every 24 hours, two weeks can seem like an eternity.
It probably feels that way for Facebook and its recent billion-dollar Instagram acquisition. They have weathered two weeks of fallout since the Dec. 17 announcement that changed the latter's user licensing agreement.
For those who have not followed the PR dustup resulting from the year-end licensing change, it can best be summarized as an attempt to retroactively establish legal ownership and monetization rights to the private photos users had previously uploaded and shared.
The consumer backlash was immediate and profound. Tens of thousands of angry online posts and videos triggered a traditional media firestorm highlighting the monetization difficulties of the world's largest social media network.
In the aftermath of the Insta-stumble, online platforms -- and companies of all stripes looking to monetize online engagement in 2013 and beyond -- are faced with the very difficult task of balancing the need for revenue while also continually meeting and, when necessary, helping to evolve, the expectations of stakeholder audiences.
To be sure, Instagram is not the first company to run afoul of user expectations. In a year filled with headline risk for some of the most savvy tech giants, including Netflix, Apple and Facebook, five key lessons have emerged for companies looking to sustain credibility, cultivate online communities and ultimately monetize users who have come to expect something for little or nothing in the online marketplace.
1. Be Social
Before announcing substantive policy changes, feature upgrades or platform updates, particularly as they relate to privacy, companies must engage their most loyal followers and fans early and often. Ask for feedback and communicate before implementing high-impact, perception-changing decisions.
Organizations might consider asking their online communities to nominate a "feedback panel" of influential power users to serve as a sounding board for new updates, policy changes or other important news. Companies will gain credibility from the community for engaging, users will feel vested in the process, and the company will also have established a credible buffer between its decisions and the larger community. It will also likely gain valuable market insight into how and when its users would be open to monetization now and in the future.
2. Don't Be a Dictator
Just because a company can legally do something doesn't mean it should. No one likes a bully, and savvy users certainly don't relish being forced into a new relationship without transparency, choice or an open forum of debate.
By default, a company's previous social community building efforts have formed a covenant with users. They agreed to enter into a relationship with certain established rules and procedures. Most understand that, as communities grow and technology updates increase the value of the platform, rules may change as well. When they do, users have a choice to make: stay in the relationship or move on to another suitor (of which there are many). This is the natural evolution of user engagement.
When companies attempt to hijack the process by making changes that are retroactive or seem to lack options, users feel violated and cheated. The covenant will be broken, and the loss of trust is nearly impossible to regain.
Provide options, an open forum for collaboration, transparency and, whenever possible, avoid retroactivity at all costs.
3. Go Slow and Over-Communicate
Most online users are inundated with a ceaseless barrage of information flooding every channel they frequent. People are more preoccupied than ever, so invariably, most of this information dump is tuned out.
In the political world, the recognized axiom is that people don't receive or hear a candidate's message until the tenth time he or she communicates it. The same goes for the social world. With the lifespan of a tweet or post now measured in seconds, the onus is on the company to over-communicate with its users and make sure they know early and often that changes are coming. Make abundantly clear the choices they have to opt out and how they can communicate feedback about the changes.
4. When You Blow It, Own It (and Soon)
Often the toughest conversation in the midst of a crisis is not when leadership recognizes they have bungled a situation and need to change course. Even to the most tone deaf executives, this usually becomes obvious only alongside negative media reports, online activity and, of course, user abandonment.
The most difficult conversation is one that focuses on how the organization takes its PR medicine and acknowledges its mistake openly and publicly in a way that resets the public discourse.
It is also critically important to remember that most users are willing to forgive missteps in the unchartered social space if those transgressions are quickly followed with a sincere and humble response. A well-executed acknowledgement (different from an apology) lays out how the original decision was reached and what the organization will do to ensure similar missteps don't happen in the future. Done property, the "clean up" effort can often lead to a net increase in positive favorability moving forward.
5. Be Creative
Facebook has been particularly adept at offering creative solutions for revenue that do not violate the basic "free" nature of the social network. Facebook gifts and strategically placed sponsored stories are just a few of the ways the social giant has looked for new ways to monetize its billion users.
As companies focus on bottom line profitability, they would be wise to consider creative new offerings that allow its most important legacy users to either continue at their original level of engagement or grow into new "freemium" features.
What if Instagram had rolled out its policy change as "opt in" revenue sharing, creating a new online marketplace for photo licensing? Millions of avid amateur photographers would have found a global marketplace overnight for photos they want to sell, and Instagram could have reaped a significant portion of the fee. New users would have come to the platform and older users could have made the choice to keep their photos private or share in the revenue.
Image courtesy of Flickr, Stacie Stacie Stacie
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