social media peer groups

Customer Intelligence in a real-time social eco-system

The pressing need in customer intelligence is a solution related to a real-time eco-system. One deeper philosophical issue in this space relates to variable velocity, to quote Lee Bryant. Tools like PeerIndex and Recorded Future do a good job of segmenting and defining the truly staggering flow of data AND audiences interacting with that data. Datasift (http://datasift.net/) is a leader in architecting methodologies for analyzing the complex fabric of the social Internet.

For an important new study on Customer Intelligence Trends 2011, see the following Forrester Report: ‎”At the same time, the demand for insight — not just data — in real time creates a challenge but also a huge opportunity to extend the value of Customer Intelligence throughout the enterprise. Leading CI professionals who evolve and adapt to these trends will quickly find themselves at the nexus of the business.” ~from Customer Intelligence Trends To Watch In 2011 (http://bit.ly/customer_intelligence_trends_2011)

WHAT IS BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE: DEFINITIONS
(Some basic info below)

Business intelligence (BI) refers to computer-based techniques used in spotting, digging-out, and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments or associated costs and incomes.

BI technologies provide historical, current, and predictive views of business operations. Common functions of Business Intelligence technologies are reporting, online analytical processing, analytics, data mining, business performance management, benchmarking, text mining, and predictive analytics.

Business Intelligence often aims to support better business decision-making. Thus a BI system can be called a decision support system (DSS). Though the term business intelligence is often used as a synonym for competitive intelligence, because they both support decision making, BI uses technologies, processes, and applications to analyze mostly internal, structured data and business processes while competitive intelligence is done by gathering, analyzing and disseminating information with or without support from technology and applications, and focuses on all-source information and data (unstructured or structured), mostly external, but also internal to a company, to support decision making. (SOURCE)

The global business intelligence (BI) software market is projected to reach $12.4 billion by the year 2015, driven by the growing need to empower all stakeholders of businesses with right information at the appropriate time.

Uncertain economic conditions, intense competition and increasing volumes of organizational information are forcing enterprises to seek efficient means of deriving value from information for improving the overall efficiency of business processes. In this regard, BI technology is emerging as an essential tool for identifying new revenue-generation opportunities as well as to control unproductive expenditures. BI offers tools, processes and applications for facilitating organizations to analyze and consolidate data gathered from various sources for optimizing operational performance and for improving business decision-making. BI and analytics software helps organizations to analyze the information built up over the years, which resides in the enterprise systems. (Source)

The World Behind the World

Behind all appearances, I divine a struggling essence. I want to merge with it. ~Nikos Kazantzakis

There is a world behind the world. The best social monitoring tools help one to peer into the vast realm of the unconscious, a place populated by archetypal entities created by sub-cultures. The voices of the unconscious realm become starkly visible in the patterns moving across and through social networks. Within these complex and varied fabrics there ripple millions of vibrations, which ultimately collate to form the deities worshipped by the various tribes roving cyberspace. It has been said that all words find their root in a god somewhere in some mythology. The collective is forming a series of complex, subtly balanced life support systems in the form of social networks populated by living cells!

theunconscious

Carl Jung writes, “…psychic contents, the so-called complexes, take over the control of the total personality in place of the ego, at least temporarily, to such a degree that the free will of the ego is suspended.” It could be said that humanity is poised on the brink of such phenomenon becoming widespread in social networks. It would not be too outlandish for a single voice to catalyze OR motivate the whole. Jung writes, “When someone is able to perform the art of touching on the archetypal, he can play on the souls of people like on the strings of a piano.” With multiple crowdsourcing sites and campaigns emerging, the mechanism is in place to reach those with an affinity to particular messagings AND swiftly guide these groups toward attractive events, products, services and causes. The collective acts like an individual and influences ALL within its own body! Jung says, “The world powers that rule over all mankind, for good or ill, are unconscious psychic factors…We are steeped in a world that was created by our own psyche.”

Currently The Firestarters in organizations are inspiring LISTENING programs AND finding ways to involve the WHOLE organization. These are the ones who understand the value of listening to the WHOLE, divining the “world behind the world” and gleaning emerging trends. Out of this, a Creative has the data to craft more finely-honed FUTURE RAGES. Jung writes, “…any autonomous complex not subject to the conscious will exerts a possessive effect on consciousness proportional to its strength and limits the latter’s freedom.” He goes on to say, “It gets you below the belt and not in your mind, your brain just counts for nothing, your sympathetic system is gripped. It is a power that fascinates people from within, it is the collective unconscious which is activated, it is an archetype which is common to them all that has come to life.” This phenomenon is occurring countless times a day in the social networks as viral elements feed on Likes and Tweets, rolling millions into seemingly irresistible currents.

Nikos Kazantzakis writes, “I feel that behind appearances this struggling essence is also striving to merge with my heart. But the body stands between us and separates us. The mind stands between us and separates us.” In the coming 12 months, I predict this sense of separation will diminish as Transparency becomes the fashionable “way to be” and world behind the world injects itself directly into daily experience through a kind of spiritual tech, fusing humanity’s hunger for piercing mystery WITH financial return. The real VALUE of transparency IS that we are introduced to MORE MYSTERY, having transcended the secrets that acted as blockades to progress. Jung writes, “The psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside, as fate.” To be conscious of ANYTHING is to be free of its influence FOR THEN we have power of choice related to its activities. Humanity yearns to open itself to possibility. Exploring the unknown through social monitoring is a FANTASTIC action for facilitating such an evolutionary process.

Be a fit node

Become a fit node in your niche, shaping your network into a star OR a hub with many spokes. This is done through finding within yourself what makes you beam AND the ROLE you will play in the CONTEXT of THE SOCIAL FABRIC OF THE INTERNET! Look at The Conversation Prism and ask yourself these questions:

QUESTION 1: Into which properties will I put content? (Go create content for THAT property!)

QUESTION 2: Into which CONTEXTS can you place this CONTENT to serve as a TRUE contributor? To be a contributor, orient yourself to the following identities that Brian Solis has identified in his excellent BEHAVIORGRAPHICS illustration:

BENEVOLENCE – “The unselfish and kindhearted behavior that engenders and promotes recognition and reciprocity, and in doing so, earns the goodwill of those around them. This is the hub of social networking with a purpose, mission, and a genuine intent to grow communities based on trust, vision, and collaboration.” ~Brian Solis

PROBLEM SOLVERS – “One of the most common sources of conversations and updates in social media are questions…people seeking information in the hopes that commenters will respond with resolution or direction.” ~Solis

EXAMPLE 1: http://www.ehow.com/
eHow.com is an online community dedicated to providing visitors the ability to research, share, and discuss solutions and tips for completing day-to-day tasks and projects.

EXAMPLE 2: http://www.wikihow.com/ wikiHow is a collaborative effort to build and share the world’s largest, highest quality how-to manual. Like Wikipedia, wikiHow is a wiki, in that anyone can write or edit a page on the site. Thousands of people from all over the world have collaboratively written 88,510 how-to articles. Over 25 million people a month read wikiHow

COMMENTERS – “Providing thoughts, opinions, observations, experiences, and sometimes, unfiltered reactions to the information shared online. They are less likely to produce original content, but are compelled to share their views based on the introduction of content by others in and around their social graph.” ~Solis

EXAMPLE OF A COMMENT THREAD: A VERY VERY LONG FACEBOOK COMMENT THREAD

RESEARCHERS – “Peer to peer influence is prominent in social networks and researchers rely on their social graphs for information and direction to make qualified decisions. They are also active in championing polls and surveys to truly learn about the thoughts and opinions of those connected to them.” ~Solis

RESEARCH RESOURCES/TOOLS
SURVEY MONKEY
WIKIPEDIA
MASHABLE’S EXCELLENT LIST OF RESEARCH SITES

CONVERSATIONALISTS – “Participation in conversations through proactive updates seeking responses or direct responses to other content, conversationalists fuel threads within and across networks.” ~Solis

CURATORS – “This group works diligently to find and only share what captivates them as filtered by what they believe will interest their followers.” ~Solis

MAGNIFY: A MEDIA CURATION TOOL
THE CONTENT CURATION DEBATE: AN EXCELLENT ARTICLE ON CONTENT CURATION

PRODUCERS – “Among the more elite group of online participants, their stature is earned by the amount of content they generate within multiple networks.” ~Solis