Who owns the customer, who owns people?
Anyone who has worked with a Telco company, or any other organisation in a data driven industry, will recognise the following comments…
…“I will accept cooperation as long as we own the customer”…
…”If we choose this direction, won’t we loose control of the customer?”…
Also, anyone who has been part of a restructuring, or a cost cutting exercise, will have heard management refer to employees as resources. Business’ feel so strongly about this they even named a department after it – Human Resources.
The best thing that could happen to marketing in 2010 is if everyone working in this industry could accept that people, customers, consumers and employees are not a cog in the marketing machinery!
Note: the picture is of Charles Chaplin in the brilliant movie; Modern times from 1936
This however would require a fundamental mind-shift, it would mean that when we go to work we should all remember that…
People can’t be owned People have always had a free mind, and a free will, but now more so than ever. They have the freedom, and the platforms to create, to express, to share, to support and to exclude, but most of all they have the freedom to choose. Simply owning some data and a database does not mean you know the person whose data you manage, it does not mean you own something real, and it definitely does not mean you own that customer!
People can’t be controlled And more importantly why would you want to? What has ever come out of controlling anything, apart from narrow mindedness and marketing myopia? As a matter of fact I would give up the notion of owning anything in today’s marketing world (customers, consumers, brand, IP, employees, ideas….). Not only because you will find it very hard to survive in this business world if you don’t, but because you will miss out on one of the great phenomena of this decade – true collaboration, and this across nations, industries, companies, departments, and disciplines!
People are not resources Human they are, resources not! They are all different, unique, interesting, and if you let them, if you give them the right support, if you create the right environment…they are your best chance of a sustainable competitive advantage! How? Through their ideas, their innovation, their ability to think in a non-linear way, their commitment – it is through all this they will affect NPD, operations, distribution, customer service, marketing and sales. That’s what makes them individuals, that’s what makes them humans and not resources!
So in this world where we focus so much on data, and on resources…let’s remember that what backs it up is people, employees, consumers, customers. Get to know them, for real, respect them, work with them, work for them, allow them to make a difference…and often, very often celebrate them!!!
But whatever you do don’t try to control them, don’t try to own them, and don’t ever think that you do!
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Having just read your ‘you don’t own people’ blog I was fizzing with conversation with self (well, there’s only me here so who else am I going to enthuse with?). While you took your direction from who owns the people and how marketing sees us all as a cog and you rightly contest that we’re people first and only by this are we of interest to marketing. Sometimes when you hear clients/planners (of which I own I’m one) talk about prospects or target audiences it’s as if they only come to being by being so defined.
Oh, how wraithlike was my existence until a company happily defined me into existence as an ‘AB male, aged 35-44, FTW, London dwelling and agrees with the statement ‘sometimes I’m too busy to prepare food’. Well, look again because I live in LA, behave like a 30 year old, listen equally to Beethoven & Yeasayer , eat only French chocolate, play the drums and have 3 kids who live abroad. Now, I’m guessing that won’t compute on anyone’s data extrapolation! But, my pick up is this. There’s a lazy, ill conceived body of marketing out there (and I don’t excuse the agency community here either) that is continually ‘doing social’ and coming up with not a lot. In this last year I’ve seen social marketing/media defined variously as 1) 1 million YouTube hits from loading up TV creative 2) a place from which to drive people to a company website 3) a better CTR than display banners 4) a fan page on Facebook that’s straight out of marketing truthspeak 101. The approach is a twisting of ‘earned media’, something that I believe in but has come to mean only a way of reducing your CPA with little or no CPM investment. That word ‘earn’ should suggest that a certain amount of effort is required to see it come good. If it’s not money then it’s time or a complimentary good or service. Anyway, I’m currently wrestling with how to do it right and explain it in a way to companies that looks like good value, is measurable on a realistic metric (so, it may not be CPA!) and creates something organic that is wholly owned by the people who adopt it. Maybe that’s where this ties in with your piece that rather than own people shouldn’t companies/marketers be striving to have people own them?