There are two aspects of human nature that are always fascinating to me. The first is that people, generally speaking, rarely take immediate action when they have a positive customer experience. The second is that people, again generally speaking, rarely like to say bad things to someone’s face. Combine those two aspects of human nature and you’ve got the fuel for social media.

Regarding positive customer experiences, I am referencing the immediate-type responses like — “Wow! Dragonfly Farms just blew my socks off with the bag of vegetables they provided this week – nice work. #CSA.” You see them – but not as often as you hear the griping and dinging.  Positive customer feedback is often delivered when someone asks your opinion on a particular brand/experience at a later point in time. For example, next spring when people are considering joining a CSA and they ask my opinion, I willingly go on and on about what a wonderful job Dragonfly Farms did and how much value we derived from their products.

That positive customer experience is very important – don’t get me wrong – but don’t expect immediate feedback from your efforts. This is important for companies to remember when launching and maintaining social media efforts. You may not truly understand the impact of your actions on the customer experience until much later. And, you may never be privy to those conversations because they will happen between the customers. Don’t underestimate your role in the experience, though, just because you are not seeing direct feedback. I like to encourage folks to pay it forward with providing immediate positive customer experience feedback because it is very motivational for organizations and the people that work for them, but the truth of the matter is that it doesn’t always happen.

Regarding our tendency to hedge on saying bad things to someone’s face – in my opinion this is probably one of the most important reasons to participate in social media. Every negative comment is an opportunity to engage and turn that experience into a positive customer interaction. The minute you engage with the person making negative comments they step back and rethink the directness of their delivery and approach. I am not suggesting that they will not provide any feedback, but rather that it will have been inadvertently filtered if it’s not given spontaneously and more anonymously. People speak their spontaneous thoughts which may be more brutal than you would prefer to a broad anonymous audience, but in this situation there is an opportunity to gain critical insights into what your customers think of your business. Then, when you address the situation you have the opportunity to engage on a more professional level with the customer and hopefully improve the overall interaction.

I had such an experience when working from my home office. I had the windows open and heard a very heated and unprofessional exchange between two men installing cable at my neighbor’s house. A quick tweet on my part, detailing how awful I thought the situation was being handled was quickly downplayed when a representative of the cable company tweeted back within moments of my tweet hitting the “wires.” I quickly back pedaled and made my tweets more professional – you see, it is easy to forget that your negative feedback can have human impact until a human is actually talking to you and reminds you of that fact.

This brings me to the point of my post.

Customers will not knock on your door and tell you how much they love you, but they will tell you that you are not so bad when confronted after a negative post – even if they still cringe at the mention of your name. It is only your effort to rectify the situation that will change their perception.

Sounds a bit like seventh grade hallway conversations doesn’t it?

I am not currently in the job market looking for a position, but I was as recently as January 2010. I also have many (more than I can count on one hand) friends and family members in the job market. And, many more who are considering entering the job market as we speak (the mass exodus that will happen when the economy starts to shift as MANY miserable and overworked employees leave at once shocking their employers because they thought everything was A-OK is fodder for another post.)

While talking to them, I get the distinct impression that some people think of social media networking – especially LinkedIn – as a tool you use once you’ve lost or job. And, that it’s just a site you plod along with while you’re working, but don’t really engage all that much. You know – accept the occasional LinkedIn request, sign in to approve it and sign out.

The point I was trying to make with my Tweet exchange with @wileyccoyote (and she totally gets it – she’s a social media rock star with INgage Networks) is that if you wait until you’ve already lost your job then you’re missing the whole point of networking. And – it’s not just about amassing large numbers of contacts and asking them to do things for you. The point of social media networking is to learn from others (none of this is a  big surprise there) but then also to be willing to teach others and ask for help when needed. It’s a quid pro quo situation and for candidates – this means that you are stronger because of your network.

You know – like the Verizon(R)  guy. When a company hires you now, they have additional factors to take into consideration. How well networked are you? If you have a business problem to solve can you reach to your network to help solve that problem quickly? If the company has a need for particular expertise, might you have some contact in your network that could solve that need? Does your network see you as valuable and do they ask for your insight on important issues?

Building these types of relationships takes time and it’s very important. Start engaging with your network NOW! Not because you have to, but because you understand that your network makes you smarter, faster, and better.

2010 is a pivotal  year from my perspective — a year where there will be more scrutiny of social media and community programs, a tightening of the money belts that have funded the initiatives to-date, and higher expectations for the successful communities.  It will be the year companies focus on making their customers truly happy with their products and services, and they will shelve talking about prospects for the time being. Those that make the cut will become “assimilated” into the enterprise environment, will be integrated with back office data and applications, and will face a new challenge — how to remain nimble and what’s next? Community and social media content held value for enterprises in 2009, but in 2011 what will your enterprise do with content that has become a commodity? That is right – a blog is a blog, and customer feedback will be customer feedback. Everyone will have it and it will not be a competitive advantage unless you are lucky enough to handpick your brilliant customers who reinvent your products or services for you. Enterprises are scrambling to address the ‘tion areas below so they are positioned to leverage their content commodities differently in 2011.

Organization

• Understanding that it is no longer about what a single organization within your enterprise is doing with social media or community; or, how a particular social media or community program performs
• All community and social media efforts must align with overall company strategy

Integration

• Smart use of technology
  • Don’t ask your core business systems to do something they can’t!
  • Ask your social content to be destination agnostic

• Do not try to “own” a single destination
• Build social widgets to embed in traditional customer destinations(in-product, on your corporate websites, in your portals, in your various community elements)
  • 2010 will be the year your competitors make their products social

Proliferation

• Roll feedback from social media and community efforts back into the business
• Internalize and make adjustments to improve the business

And — it is a long way away, but if companies focus on these areas in 2010, then 2011 might well become the year of the prospect. Finally.

Let’s face it.

If you are an enterprise with a traditional website, your community is probably now the most trafficked section – especially if you are doing any support or product idea sharing. It is going to be very tempting to add a bunch of “stuff” to your community just to get it some exposure by justifying it as “useful to community members.” Beware this temptation.

And – even if you are a small to medium-sized business, this warning still stands. Your website might BE your community. As it grows, evolves and matures you are going to be tempted to add some of the traditional website content or functionality. Beware this temptation.

There are two entirely different types of content and one of the quickest ways to dilute the value of your community is to clutter it with content and utilities that are not truly social in nature. Your community should not be viewed as the one gateway for customers to experience the wealth of information about your company. It should be viewed as the one gateway to all things two-way in nature.

At the core of this concept is the definition of community, right?

The definition I would like to use is actually from several years ago, but I bumped into it again recently. It says that communities have:

1) Boundaries (not everyone can join)

2) A sense of common purpose (together we achieve more than we do alone)

3) Reciprocity (one-to-one relationships)

4) Rules (and penalties)

5) Self-determination (community cannot be imposed)

If you are considering adding links to applications or new content that will be “useful to community members” and it does not satisfy these criteria, then leave it out.

Examples might include knowledge bases, event listings, user group lists, software download sites, and news feeds. Unless these types of content are being pulled into the community AND allow reciprocity (comments, rating, bookmarking, tagging) then it will just cloud the community-building waters.

Leave all that other content where it belongs and where people expect it – in the top navigation of every conventional website out there. I am sure it really belongs in one of your Products, Solutions, Services, Support, or About Us buckets anyway.