Creat More Value Than You Capture

Create More Value Than You Capture

Tim O’Reilly

O’Reilly Media, Inc.www.oreilly.com

Inbound Marketing SummitApril 29, 2009

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

The secret of social media is that it's not about you, your product, or your story. It's about how you can add value to the communities that happen to include you. If you want to make a positive impact, forget about what you can get out of social media, and start thinking about what you can contribute. Funnily enough, the more value you create for the community, the more value they will create for you.




Some Examples from O’Reilly’s History

• The commercialization of the Internet





The network as platform means that competitive advantage goes to systems that harness network effects to get better the more people use them.


In each case, we’ve told a big story by amplifying the voices of a community of early adopters.

In each case, we’ve built our business by creating even more value for others.


Questions for marketers

• What assets do you have that increase in value through participation?

– Knowledge about your customers?– Knowledge from your customers?– Your brand as it is spread by others?– Your accumulated history?

• What assets do you have that benefit from the real time nature of online information?

• How do you involve your customers in increasing the value to them of what you do?

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social network graph of congressional twitterers




my twitter input feed


my twitter output feed


retweetradar


nivi and the @timoreilly bump


NyTimes twitter feed for contrast


This is important!

• In social networks, you gain and bestow status through those you associate with

• A key function of a publishing brand is the bestowal of status by what you pay attention to

• If you only pay attention to yourself, you aren’t as valuable to your community

– You don’t learn as much from your readers– You don’t bind them to you by amplifying their

voice


Times People - it’s a ghost town for me


NY Times letters to the editor


NY Times most popular articles


Opportunities?

• All those people who emailed stories probably commented in their email. Invite them to share?

• Does this make them more valuable to advertisers?

• Most blogged? Where are the links? • Most mailed ≠ most blogged• If I’ve already read it, I might want to “digg” it, twitter it, tag it in del.icio.us? Too geeky for most readers? Add configuration to my subscription


What Makes a Platform Tick?


housingmaps.com - the very first Google maps mashup• It was a “hack.” Google learned from it, quickly, and turned it into a supported feature



Google maps as a model

• Mashups were invented by users - the API came later to support them

• It’s open• It’s two-way: innovations outside Google can be brought onto Google


If you’re really building a platform, your customers and partners build new features before you do


Not invented by Twitter




Stocktwits


tweetdeck


peoplebrowsr


Why I like the twhirl client



Ginx has some interesting new features


bit.ly as a twitter client

• How about offering this kind of thing from the NYT?


bit.ly and the power of instant tracking


my facebook news feed


Lessons from Twitter

• Do one thing and do it well• Let others build on what you do, even if it appears to compete with you

• When users innovate, support their behaviors in your platform (@, #, $)

• “Insert and extend” :-)


Random Acts of Shaqness




Create more value than you capture


Work on stuff that matters


Taking a Road Trip

• http://autos.canada.com/greatcanadianroadtrip/index.html


http://autos.canada.com/greatcanadianroadtrip/index.html


Taking a Road Trip

• http://autos.canada.com/greatcanadianroadtrip/index.html




It’s not a tour of gas stations!


This might be where you end up

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2008/06/12/opinion/0613-GASPUMPS_index.html




For More Information

• What is Web 2.0? http://www.oreillynet.com/go/web2 • http://tim.oreilly.com• http://radar.oreilly.com• http://twitter.com/timoreilly

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http://www.oreillynet.com/go/web2

http://www.oreillynet.com/go/web2

http://tim.oreilly.com

http://tim.oreilly.com

http://radar.oreilly.com




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Creat More Value Than You Capture