POWER OF FREE! #12: Reinventing Value & Price in Intelligent Content Marketing: The Digital Attention Economy

So we are in an attention economy as well. And then attention economy, essentially what you’re trying to do is you’re trying to create happiness. Because if you can create a marketplace where consumers are happy with what they’ve got with you, they’ll stick around.

And if they stick around, the likelihood is that they’ll take some action on your website, whatever that next action might be. And then you can essentially carry them down a path that really they ought to be traveling for their benefits, and also yours. So the issue here is relevancy. You’ve got to understand what your marketplace the audience is really looking for, and you’ve got to deliver it to them because it has to be relevant.

So we know that we have to command people’s attention. That’s the mission. But what about building a business out of that? Now, in 1995, Don Tapscott wrote a book called the digital economy. And in the digital economy, he sets out, basically these nine facets of how our world will be realized and understood as a result of operating in a digital economy. And so, he said in 1995, that the next wave of economic activity would all be in the digital realm. It’s all about knowledge based businesses. He said that also value would disaggregate and then re aggregate in new and interesting ways.

And so when we looked at our business model, we realized that by giving everything away for free in the way that we did, we could then put value back into the marketplace where we were actually able to deliver it the touch points where that value was best reflected. And this is enabled in the digital economy. He also said that you need to focus on creating value in the physical world and in the digital world. And this is an example of me creating value in the physical world. But also in our business model. I have the ability or other I make myself available for people to contact me at any time and answer their questions. So it doesn’t all have to be through the prism of a computer relationship.

It’s, it’s actually one to one as well. Don Tapscott said that the fundamental unit of the business economy is changing from the cooperation to the individual. And that’s so true, because we, as people have relationships with other people. If you think about the relationships that you have in the digital world today, how many of you have got a relationship with a company, that’s not the one that you’re working for? So for better or for worse, in our business, it’s focused on me, which is good news. And it’s bad news. It’s good news, because it means that we’re able to build the tribe that we’ve built. But it’s bad news, because it means at some stage, if I’m going to be a smart entrepreneur, I need to exit this business or exit my day to day role in this business.

Now, fortunately, I have a plan. But essentially, in building this business, it’s all been built fundamentally around me, if you will. And that’s what Don Tapscott said. He also says that trust will replace conventional forms of control. Because if you’re having open relationships with people in the digital realm, then they’re going to get to know about you and you’re going to get to know about them and the conditions for trust emerge. And I like to believe that our professional practice is built on the fundamentals of trust all the way through everything that we do. Don Tapscott also said that, companies will be viewed as part of the business ecosystem and not standalone entities. And I didn’t sort of fully appreciate that when I sort of first read that because I wasn’t experiencing it at the time. But now I can put myself into where we are today. And I understand what this is all about. And an example of this is the way that we make our video production facilities available in the wider community and we don’t expect any sort of money for that. We’ll just try and help and add value. in interesting ways.

And so in that regard, you know, we are in a small way, you know, multifaceted, nobody would sort of point a finger at us and say, Well, perhaps you’re just that and that alone, you are these other things as well. And I think that’s a natural dynamic of what happens in the connection economy when value is sort of dissipating and interesting ways. producers and consumers become blurred as products and services become ever more customized. At some point, the knowledge transfer between what the customer wants and the person who’s delivering the value will overlap. And because of that, you have to start thinking about how the commercial aspects of that would be experienced. Marketing moves from one way broadcast to two way dialogue.

And that’s clearly occurred and increasingly is the way that we would always expect to operate now. And then businesses that create online communities will generate unparalleled customer loyalty. And it’s so true because every customer that comes our way we have a relationship with and if you have a relationship that’s based on respect, then those relationships endure. And as a result of that, the the tribe emerges if you will. So, when you understand all these things, ultimately every company will require a web based business model to be successful.

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