Community relationships
Category Lego Lotus
Bookmark :
Bear with me, this is a long one. And you might have heard the story before, but I think it needs telling. I'll start with something dear to my heart; Lego.
Not so long ago, Lego was in trouble. Big trouble. They were rapidly loosing market share and money. In fact, it's been said that Lego was within 12 months of going under. This, from a world leading company with a history going back over 50 years. In fact, things were so bad that some tough decisions were made and a re-organisation had to be undetaken.
One of the main reasons Lego was loosing its' customers was that it was failing to understand them. At this point I'll give you some background. There is such a thing in the Lego community as an AFOL or Adult Fan of Lego. I'm one, and so are many, many other people around the globe. In fact, AFOLs have probably been around since Legos' first customers reached 16. AFOLs have more income than kids, so we spend more on our hobby. We're also passionate, vocal and interested in the cause. We have forums and blogs and closed communities and open communities and software downloads and standards, etc etc.
As Lego sales went down, AFOLs and kids were unhappy. You see, Lego had digressed from its' original ideas. Sets were no longer boxes of bricks, but contained many special parts. This was designed to make them easier to build and hence lower the entry age - but it wasn't working. AFOLs and kids alike saw these sets and didn't like them. They wanted their boxes of bricks. So, we all stopped buying and carried on using what we already had. No need to re-purchase each year.
So, what did Lego do? Well, they had a re-org (always a good idea when things aren't looking so good) and split up the company into 3 main divisions - Markets and Products, Operations and Community, Education and Direct. Of course, lots more was done, but the short story is that the products changed back, they targeted markets and Lego are doing very well now, thankyou. I want to talk about the Community division though.
You see, one of the problems Lego had, is that although it was aware AFOLs existed, they didn't know who they were - or what they were buying. They didn't know what sets were popular with them and what weren't. They didn't know how their target market would react to something until they had already done it. The Community division were tasked with fixing this. One of their main roles was to work with the community at large and find out what they wanted to buy.
Today, Lego have 2 people (just two) working full-time as Community Development Managers. Their job is focused solely on working with the community. They go to local events all over the world. They start up customer focus groups and design groups. They run the First Lego League (a global teenage robotics championship). They bring in their best customers to help them plan new product lines - right from the outset. They have even employed a number of their best customers, as Lego realised that their customers were better with their products than some of their own people. They listen, they involve, they placate, they explain, they facilitate.
It turned out that those AFOL's actually made upto 15% of Legos' market. Not the majority of course, but a very sizable chunk. Of course, these AFOLs were spending much more per capita than children - perhaps many thousands of dollars per year. So, Lego tried new things. They brought out large, complex, expensive sets that only adults would buy. But they bought these sets in their droves, and soon a whole range of these sets came out, designed by ex-customers in many cases, and selling incredibly well.
Lego listened to their community, and it brought them away from the brink. Now, just imagine what a company that's already doing well, with a strong community, could do if they did the same?
-----------------------------
You'll probably guess that this isn't really about Lego, it's about IBM Lotus. Well, you'd be right - because yet again the community is up in arms, angry with things that are happening, angry that they weren't involved, and for those that are involved - they feel put upon. I'll call it out and say it - IBM, you need to understand the community.
I'll be honest here. We're make much more noise than we make money. We're quick to anger and difficult to please. BUT, if we are pleased, we shout it from the rooftops. We fight trolls, and bad press and competitor FUD. We hate not knowing what's going on, and we really hate being told to do something.
But, who are IBMs' Community Development Managers? Who are the people that help Paul organise ILUG, or sit in OpenNTF meeting shouting 'STOP!, you'll been shot down for this!'?, or take cool new software to influential bloggers and twitterers and show them cool, new stuff? Who from IBM is knocking on Stephen Frys' doorstep saying, 'Can I show you this?. Who is it? It isn't anyone. And I know it isn't anyone because I've never seen them.
I know IBM's answer to this is 'everyone plays their part'. And I know that Ed and Mary Beth have done a brilliant job of this for years. But it isn't their job. Their no.1 concern is not keeping the excitement alive and placating noisy bloggers. And guess what? The current approach is NOT working. Why the hell should we even be up in arms about a software repository that give everyone access to free code? I'll own up to throwing wood on the fire to see if it would burn - but I really get the feeling that there was no-one there at the start thinking 'this is a community project, how will the community react to this?' If they did, they sure as hell didn't get it right. All that's now happening is other IBM promises are being questioned, such as aircover etc.
What I find incredible, is that the leading provider of community and collaboration software in the world, doesn't have anyone whose job it is to work that community and get the best out of it.
Just think of what IBM could do if it really leveraged the community, instead of fighting against it.
Bookmark :
Bear with me, this is a long one. And you might have heard the story before, but I think it needs telling. I'll start with something dear to my heart; Lego.
Not so long ago, Lego was in trouble. Big trouble. They were rapidly loosing market share and money. In fact, it's been said that Lego was within 12 months of going under. This, from a world leading company with a history going back over 50 years. In fact, things were so bad that some tough decisions were made and a re-organisation had to be undetaken.
One of the main reasons Lego was loosing its' customers was that it was failing to understand them. At this point I'll give you some background. There is such a thing in the Lego community as an AFOL or Adult Fan of Lego. I'm one, and so are many, many other people around the globe. In fact, AFOLs have probably been around since Legos' first customers reached 16. AFOLs have more income than kids, so we spend more on our hobby. We're also passionate, vocal and interested in the cause. We have forums and blogs and closed communities and open communities and software downloads and standards, etc etc.
As Lego sales went down, AFOLs and kids were unhappy. You see, Lego had digressed from its' original ideas. Sets were no longer boxes of bricks, but contained many special parts. This was designed to make them easier to build and hence lower the entry age - but it wasn't working. AFOLs and kids alike saw these sets and didn't like them. They wanted their boxes of bricks. So, we all stopped buying and carried on using what we already had. No need to re-purchase each year.
So, what did Lego do? Well, they had a re-org (always a good idea when things aren't looking so good) and split up the company into 3 main divisions - Markets and Products, Operations and Community, Education and Direct. Of course, lots more was done, but the short story is that the products changed back, they targeted markets and Lego are doing very well now, thankyou. I want to talk about the Community division though.
You see, one of the problems Lego had, is that although it was aware AFOLs existed, they didn't know who they were - or what they were buying. They didn't know what sets were popular with them and what weren't. They didn't know how their target market would react to something until they had already done it. The Community division were tasked with fixing this. One of their main roles was to work with the community at large and find out what they wanted to buy.
Today, Lego have 2 people (just two) working full-time as Community Development Managers. Their job is focused solely on working with the community. They go to local events all over the world. They start up customer focus groups and design groups. They run the First Lego League (a global teenage robotics championship). They bring in their best customers to help them plan new product lines - right from the outset. They have even employed a number of their best customers, as Lego realised that their customers were better with their products than some of their own people. They listen, they involve, they placate, they explain, they facilitate.
It turned out that those AFOL's actually made upto 15% of Legos' market. Not the majority of course, but a very sizable chunk. Of course, these AFOLs were spending much more per capita than children - perhaps many thousands of dollars per year. So, Lego tried new things. They brought out large, complex, expensive sets that only adults would buy. But they bought these sets in their droves, and soon a whole range of these sets came out, designed by ex-customers in many cases, and selling incredibly well.
Lego listened to their community, and it brought them away from the brink. Now, just imagine what a company that's already doing well, with a strong community, could do if they did the same?
-----------------------------
You'll probably guess that this isn't really about Lego, it's about IBM Lotus. Well, you'd be right - because yet again the community is up in arms, angry with things that are happening, angry that they weren't involved, and for those that are involved - they feel put upon. I'll call it out and say it - IBM, you need to understand the community.
I'll be honest here. We're make much more noise than we make money. We're quick to anger and difficult to please. BUT, if we are pleased, we shout it from the rooftops. We fight trolls, and bad press and competitor FUD. We hate not knowing what's going on, and we really hate being told to do something.
But, who are IBMs' Community Development Managers? Who are the people that help Paul organise ILUG, or sit in OpenNTF meeting shouting 'STOP!, you'll been shot down for this!'?, or take cool new software to influential bloggers and twitterers and show them cool, new stuff? Who from IBM is knocking on Stephen Frys' doorstep saying, 'Can I show you this?. Who is it? It isn't anyone. And I know it isn't anyone because I've never seen them.
I know IBM's answer to this is 'everyone plays their part'. And I know that Ed and Mary Beth have done a brilliant job of this for years. But it isn't their job. Their no.1 concern is not keeping the excitement alive and placating noisy bloggers. And guess what? The current approach is NOT working. Why the hell should we even be up in arms about a software repository that give everyone access to free code? I'll own up to throwing wood on the fire to see if it would burn - but I really get the feeling that there was no-one there at the start thinking 'this is a community project, how will the community react to this?' If they did, they sure as hell didn't get it right. All that's now happening is other IBM promises are being questioned, such as aircover etc.
What I find incredible, is that the leading provider of community and collaboration software in the world, doesn't have anyone whose job it is to work that community and get the best out of it.
Just think of what IBM could do if it really leveraged the community, instead of fighting against it.
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