Socialnomics and Me

I just finished wrapping up Socialnomics by Erik Qualman. I was reading it outside this weekend, which probably contributed to my sunburn - some exciting ideas in this book that I'll be applying to my individual project and my professional development.

You can often leverage preexisting human capital or preexisting products and solutions.

Socialnomics uses the example of TripAdvisor's Cities I've Visited application, which they were able to produce quickly and inexpensively. I've fallen into the trap before of thinking that my company or I can generate technological solutions for specific problems, when often there's a free or cheap solution right out there on the web. Great example: we used to produce really elaborate driving map directions on our website. Now we use Google Driving Directions.

Speed to Market is Essential. Don't Try to "Boil the Ocean."

If you're launching a new product or service, it doesn't have to be 100% fail-safe in terms of brand and user security. If your customers or users are excited about your product, they'll give you the necessary feedback to make it better, or improve on it in ways you didn't think. With social media and online products, it's fantastically easy to make tweaks and change course, which is something we don't always "get."

Let kids take ownership of your brand.

Millenials /Generation Y / Z are willing to add brand content to their profiles and social networking sites. They're also the ones who are shaping perception of your brand. We spend so much time thinking about how we maintain our brand and corporate image, and not enough time thinking about what kids and other customers are saying about us.