Modern social media comes in many shapes in forms these days - online user communities, blogs, consumer reviews such as Trip Advisor and Amazon, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Foursquare to name just some. Going forward we can expect to welcome more and more innovative concepts in this space, all fueled by ubiquitous access to connectivity, continuous proliferation of portable (or even wearable) computing and the eternal human nature of curiosity and desire to be heard.
Social Media helps people connect in a meaningful way. With the help of Internet connectivity emerging shared interest often leads to formation of online groups and audiences of all sizes, some only exist briefly and fall apart (think of a comments thread for a Facebook post), some turn into large active online communities. Product Managers who find a way to attract the right people to their audience and turn that audience into a stable self-sufficient online community gain access to a powerful strategic resource.
People who join online communities are typically at first driven by curiosity, but some of them end up expressing their opinions and often find themselves contributing in ways that help strengthen and grow these communities. It does not really matter if some voices in the room are negative, what matters is that people have opinions and care to express them.
Having access to this pool of people, weather they are colleagues, partners or customers is invaluable for Product Managers as this enables targeted communication with the audience you helped build and therefore know well. This can help with market research, Agile product development customer validation, product usability studies, new design wireframes reviews, identification of new differentiation opportunities and pain points and more.
People who join online communities are typically at first driven by curiosity, but some of them end up expressing their opinions and often find themselves contributing in ways that help strengthen and grow these communities. It does not really matter if some voices in the room are negative, what matters is that people have opinions and care to express them.
Having access to this pool of people, weather they are colleagues, partners or customers is invaluable for Product Managers as this enables targeted communication with the audience you helped build and therefore know well. This can help with market research, Agile product development customer validation, product usability studies, new design wireframes reviews, identification of new differentiation opportunities and pain points and more.
