Brand Monitoring is only the first step
There was an interesting article in the NY Times about brand monitoring in the New Media world. They definitely nailed the point that the explosion of New Media is already changing the way companies think about how they manage branding, customer feedback and market research. Frankly, they probably understated it – it is pretty clear to many of us in the industry that the delivery of news (and information, really) is being tackled by a truly disruptive technology and the next 5 years is going to see some really interesting developments.
They talked a lot about using technology to filter and monitor the chatter out there. They didn’t talk at all about the next, even more valuable step — engaging your markets. Filtering and monitoring is fine, but remember, the end result can give you real information you can use to engage customers and build markets for your products and services.
Blogs, boards, MySpace, etc. allow companies to create dynamic relationships with customers. Heck, I’d even call it friendships. Why sit back and simply report on what consumers are thinking when you can talk to them about it? Or how about provide some real value to the people interested in your brand by helping them find other interested people to talk to and have them all help you design products? Or reach out to those disgruntled consumers by contacting them and having them become part of your consumer-feedback inner-circle?