Recently two potential clients gave the exact same reason (or was it an excuse?) for delaying the start of a social business project: “We need to sort out our brand first.” So was it a simple coincidence or not? In any case it got me thinking. What makes organizations believe that they need to “sort [...]

Needless to say that crowdsourcing with customers is getting big and that many companies are attempting to emulate lighthouse examples as MyStarbucksIdea and Dell Ideastorm. Obviously this is easier said than done. Many initiatives founder after the initial excitement. What makes MyStarbucksIdea work?

In this era of Word of Mouth, having brand ambassadors proclaiming the virtues of your new & improved product is absolutely essential. But suppose you do not have a pool of ambassadors, what then? Well, you can simply buy them, can’t you? There are numerous intermediaries that offer a database of ‘pioneers’, ‘community leaders’ or [...]