Entrants have the opportunity to win £15,000 in Grand Prize

Winners of 11 categories will each receive £5,000 cash to boost their business

Awards launch as eBay UK reveals June saw the biggest year-on-year spike in new businesses joining the platform during lockdown, up 335% compared with June 2019

eBay has today opened entries for this year’s eBay for Business Awards, offering eBay entrepreneurs the chance to win up to £20,000.

The eBay for Business Awards is eBay UK’s fourth annual nationwide competition to find and celebrate the most successful, innovative, and inspiring entrepreneurs from the platform’s 300,000-strong community of small businesses.

Following an incredibly challenging start to the year for many small businesses, each of the 11 category prize winners will receive a £5,000 prize. They will also be given a free one-year eBay Anchor Store Subscription and access to eBay’s Concierge, the gold-plated customer service team, together valued at over £15,000, to support them in navigating the effects of the crisis. This year’s Grand Prize winner will receive an extra £15,000, totalling £20,000, as well as a unique marketing bundle worth over £100,000, in recognition of their entrepreneurial success.

The launch of this year’s Awards comes as eBay reveals the trend of setting up a start-up has become more mainstream in lockdown, as the number of new businesses joining eBay surged 335% in June. This figure represents the biggest year-on-year spike in new businesses joining eBay UK since the pandemic began.

The data also shows the number of new start-ups joining eBay UK grew consistently each month during lockdown, as the number of new businesses joining the platform in June was almost 40% greater than in April when the impact of lockdown was first felt.

Rob Hattrell, VP, eBay UK, commented: “This year has been an undoubtedly tough one for many small businesses, as SMEs up and down the country have fought to continue trading throughout the pandemic. Our sellers have shown real agility and resilience in dealing with the disruption to keep their businesses moving, which is why we want to celebrate the achievements of our valued sellers with bigger prizes than ever for the 2020 Awards.

“I’m looking forward to finding out about the unique stories behind the brightest and best of our small business community on eBay. Whether you’re a kitchen table side hustle, a family-run business or a lockdown start-up, we want to hear from you!”

 Jake Harris, owner of Into Music and winner of last year’s Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award commented: “Working closely with the eBay team over the past year has been one of the best parts about winning my award. As a Young Entrepreneur, to receive this recognition has given me the confidence to take my small business to the next level. I used the prize money to help secure a lease on a new premises, in order to increase our online capacity and also open a physical store. Even though this had to close during lockdown, I could never have expected that sales would be up by 120% on the first six months of this year compared to 2019!”

Winners will be chosen by a panel of expert judges, including eBay UK VP Rob Hattrell and a selection of last year’s award winners, and will be announced on social media at the end of October. Entrants should submit their entry on the eBay for Business awards website www.ebayawards.com.

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post eBay opens entries to 4th annual eBay for Business Awards to celebrate entrepreneur success appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

What is summarised in this presentation are the following ideas related with the concept of open innovation, open communication and open government as the new key drivers for businesses and society:

Ubiquitous Comms (communication) Platform + New Culture of Open x People = Open Government
Ubiquitous Comms Platform + New Culture of Open x People = Open Business

The conclusion isn’t simply that better reputation management is needed. Rather that the age of spin is finally over. White-washing, green-washing, washing does not work full-stop. Being as clean and open as one can be in the grubby real world of business is the only answer as popular judgement is passed daily with real and lasting impact to share prices. The most recent example is a boycott ofPayPal @: via hashtag  #OpPaypal wiping $900m off the share-price of parent company eBay in just 15 min of trading on the NASDAQ.

This doesn’t mean not making mistakes. It means being open what and when you do in order to improve, adpating towards the needs of your customers, clients, audience. Domino’s Pizza are another great recent example of using social media to demonstrate being an open business as a matter of pride. They can do this because they know they will excel and they understood they have to be open. Without being a business as open as possible all the old methods of communication will not work. The flip is it’s no longer what you say but what you do.

One must appreciate this is going to be the most significant shift modern business has ever had to make and a long, difficult and continous process of change. Following the initial insights and disruption started by social media, businesses are now obliged to shift for open business models. And this is actually a great oportunity for them. It’s why Open business Council appears as a platform and champions the model of Open Business as its raison d’etre (manifesto). It’s why we co-founded The Open Business Council to work with companies, organisations, governments trail-blazing Openness in their business and management processes to understand the value, impact and consequences of their work.

To conclude it is inevitable that brands, companies and organisations must restructure to meet the expressed needs and/or opinions of the public and the disruptive new trends of technologies, economy within the scope of social media. It’s not a question of if, but when they must move to meet their customers collective practical and moral needs. Those companies and organisations that make that move first will be first to convert apathetic consumers into engaged partners  – scaling what they can achieve together rather than spending millions second guessing their needs from a distance.

Maria Fonseca

Maria Fonseca is the Editor and Infographic Artist for IntelligentHQ. She is also a thought leader writing about social innovation, sharing economy, social business, and the commons. Aside her work for IntelligentHQ, Maria Fonseca is a visual artist and filmmaker that has exhibited widely in international events such as Manifesta 5, Sao Paulo Biennial, Photo Espana, Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Joshibi University and many others. She concluded her PhD on essayistic filmmaking , taken at University of Westminster in London and is preparing her post doc that will explore the links between creativity and the sharing economy.

The post Why Social Media Means Open Business appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Why Google and Facebook are the biggest Open Research platforms?

When thinking about open research one might look primary at Universities: MIT, Standford, Cambridge,  Oxford, CBS and many other top universities worldwide. When looking at open research one can have a look at sophisticated innovative platforms getting real time data using very advanced software.

But after some time thinking one understands that the largest direct research and marketing platforms in the world are software companies, websites and social media platforms. Indeed, the most important research and data can now be found in massive platforms such as the search engine  Google; the multiple product platform that recently embarked into social media as well. Also, not forgetting  the massive Social media platform – Facebook. If you have some doubts I will try to explain why I have this conclusion.

Defining Open research

Defining Open research as an activity conducted in the spirit of free and open source software brings us to the idea of looking at both platforms in which most of the data is based. When not based there the data somehow is agregated and united there. Much like open source schemes that are built around a source code that is made public. Both Google and Facebook are at the moment matrix places and destinies for where the main drivers for research somehow can be found and data mined.

Having considered that the central theme of open research is to make clear accounts of the methodology freely available via the web, and online devices along with, any data or results extracted or derived from them of course one needs to bare in mind these two platforms as the main central platforms of research. Looking at these platforms as  matrix places of research that permit a massively distributed collaboration, and one in which anyone may participate at any level of a research project.

Dramatic and broad technological and economic shift in which software is keyto research and business

At present the world is in the middle of a dramatic and broad technological and economic shift where software companies, namelly web based or somehow powered by social technologies and venture international capital are poised to take over large sections of the economy. This creates new oportunities and challenges for old business models and changes the way research has been conducted. In this landscape the paper of research is still in its premium form based in Universities, research centers and scholar organisations of course. However the shift is that these places and the premium global centers for research have to look at the real time data of search engines and the social media web to be on the top of what are the trends and new developments. It is in here that Open research is taking its place and becoming the only way to go in parallel with ways of looking into change management and open business. Also it is here that Facebook and Google have been increasingly being part of the picture. But we can add as well other online critical tools for Open Research: Wikipedia, Amazon, LinkedIn, Slideshare, Twitter, Apple iTunes and Apps, open source tools and so forth.

A blurred world where economy works in parallel with crisis innovation: Open Research is  the new driver

Major businesses and industries are increasingly being run on as online services based on software. Most industries are shifting to this format: from entertainment, agriculture,  national organisations such as finance and banking to defense or any other area that can vary from B2B to B2C. Many of the winners in this new blurred world where economy works in parallel with crisis, innovation and research are somehow Silicon Valley-style entrepreneurial technology companies that are invading and overturning established industry structures. Over the next years many more industries will be disrupted by fast research and new developments in software, online services, social business trends and data. It is in here that Open reserach can have and needs to be present as a driver of accelaration for knowledge learning and map new trends, oportunites and solutions to problems and issues.

Over two billion people now use the broadband Internet, up from perhaps 50 million a decade ago. Facebook reach is getting close to one billion users and it is expected at least five billion people worldwide to own smartphones; giving every individual with such a phone instant access to the full power of the Internet and Google hegemonic search results (and also Baidu and Yandex) every moment of every day.

On the back end Open Research needs to aim at making the world of information, knowledge and science more visible and accessible pooling together pieces of information from multiple platforms namelly Google and Facebook that constitute a vast knowledge base about who we all are, and what moves the world forward.

Maria Fonseca

Maria Fonseca is the Editor and Infographic Artist for IntelligentHQ. She is also a thought leader writing about social innovation, sharing economy, social business, and the commons. Aside her work for IntelligentHQ, Maria Fonseca is a visual artist and filmmaker that has exhibited widely in international events such as Manifesta 5, Sao Paulo Biennial, Photo Espana, Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Joshibi University and many others. She concluded her PhD on essayistic filmmaking , taken at University of Westminster in London and is preparing her post doc that will explore the links between creativity and the sharing economy.

The post Are Google and Facebook the biggest Open Research platforms? appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Open comms; an admirable world of voices to listen to and to watch wind blowing data!

When we think about communications for business, were is the wind blowing? Optimists can point to the introduction of new areas powered by social technologies that somehow open business towards a relation and interaction with customers, new structures of defining strategies and change management that opens a lot of new enterprise oportunities. Pessimists can point to the continuing deluge of all negative spam attention, ever-more sophisticated phishing techniques, and of course the burdens of increased regulatory compliance, legal and difficulty to reach an audience, target customers in the right way, listen to the voices around you or your business and analyse its data and analytics.

Open Communications – Open Comms are the Next generation for collaboration

Open Communications – Open Comms – is the next generation of human communications and collaboration in any organisation leading the field in delivering new ways of communicating and creating co-creation process and synergies. I am one of the positive ones looking at it. Open Comms can and is indeed shifting the way business, organisations and contries deal with their communications. And let me tell you this is hard, difficult and new, but amazing.

Some recent stats show that 57% of businesses currently monitor online conversations about the brand, products or services, according to a recent study by Capgemini. But the reality is that 20% do not listen at all and another 23% of respondents weren’t sure whether or not the company is listening to online conversations in the same study.

This reveals the importantce of a proper communication strategy and a lot about the importance and the necessity to invest in an open communications strategy.

Why am I a defender of Open Comms?

Because I believe in creating value and listening to different voices, even when sometimes we might hear things that we don’t want to hear and that are different from our own perspectives or ideas. I believe that the only way to deliver successful strategy is challenging certainty, especially our own. When you or your business might think you’re undeniably right, ask yourself “What might I be missing here in this communication?”. And when you start listening to your clients, users, customers you might want to adpat, change or evolve. (Although I must underline this does not mean forget your core values of principles).

In a world with a huge increasing variety of principles, cultures and lack of clear hegemonies things are flowing. It is rather difficult to understand everything form one’s own perspective.And social media fast adopting technologies and tools just created a world without barries: economic, politic, financial where change and continous change and evoltion has been radical.

The market of communications has been through a revolution with an entire new industry for listening services rapidly maturing with vendors such as Radian6, Spiral16, Crimson Hexagon, Research.ly, Lithium, Sysomos, Marketing Sentinel (Skyttle) and many others improving businesses communications and monitoring consumer conversations and experiences. Nevertheless the wide array of these new communications tools and capabilities are nothing less than baffling. They somehow require proper stratgey open mind set for business and expert analysis prior to committing any significant investment of finances or organizational resources now and over time.

Some perspectives for the future of Communications = Open Communications:

– The need for an Unified Communication: from internal to external, from traditional to social;
– Open IT-Based Communications, make sure software is fast in execution
– Powerful set up in a content and SEO friendly way;
– Fixed Mobile Convenience and convergence with the advent of the mobile tablets and smartphones;
– Agile Business Process Integration towards the concept of a Open Business;
– Rich User Experience and knowledge how to navigate in the data and analytics;
– Deployment of Choices, clear transparent management capable of communicate internally and externally;

– Business Continuity and Integrity, key for a good communications, the importance of a good continuity story telling.

Maria Fonseca

Maria Fonseca is the Editor and Infographic Artist for IntelligentHQ. She is also a thought leader writing about social innovation, sharing economy, social business, and the commons. Aside her work for IntelligentHQ, Maria Fonseca is a visual artist and filmmaker that has exhibited widely in international events such as Manifesta 5, Sao Paulo Biennial, Photo Espana, Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Joshibi University and many others. She concluded her PhD on essayistic filmmaking , taken at University of Westminster in London and is preparing her post doc that will explore the links between creativity and the sharing economy.

The post Open comms and the future of communications? appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Monetary rewards as necessary condition and signal for ethics and commitment

In my last post I talked about the importance of monetary and rewards and non-cash prices in social business as it attracts extrinsically motivated people and it shows the company’s attitude, recognition and commitment towards collaboration with external stakeholders. Attractive rewards signal that a business, company or organisation doesn’t want to exploit consumers but appreciates the effort that participants invest and the (potential) value that their submissions can create.

Social and Digital Co-creation experiences as sufficient condition

But everyone who has experience with co-creation projects knows that the key for a successful co-creation project lies in attracting and engaging intrinsically motivated people. Thus, if we want to increase the value for Co-Creators we first have to understand what motivates Co-Creators besides monetary rewards. What are their underlying intrinsic motives and what do they expect from co-creation initiatives in terms of the process and the outcomes.

I think Clay Shirky give some great insights into the role of intrinsic motivations on our behaviors. Clay Shirky has written a great book on “Cognitive surplus”.

And I think the phenomenon of “cognitive surplus” explains pretty good what is happening in social media and why consumers are willed to participate in co-creation. In his book Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age and his TED Talk How cognitive surplus will change the world he is making the point that “people are now learning how to use more constructively the free time afforded to them since the 1940s for creative acts rather than consumptive ones, particularly with the advent of online tools that allow new forms of collaboration. But while social technologies enable creative activity, the underlying motives for work we do with our spare brain cycles aren’t fueled by external rewards but by intrinsic motivation—the joy of doing something for its own sake.”

The open source movement – with prominent examples like Wikipedia, linux or apache – is a great example that shows the power of intrinsic motivated people enabled and leveraged by social technologies. But why do consumers contribute to co-creation projects initiated by producers? In contrast to open source software where users immediately benefit from using their programmed code, consumers participating in virtual new product development will hardly ever be able to immediately benefit from using “their” innovation. If at all, the co-created products will be available on the market 6-12 months later at the earliest. Working on co-creation projects together with profit-oriented firms may further crowd-out voluntary participation. As motives depend on context, exploring who and why one engages in virtual cocreation projects initiated by producers is worthwhile.

Recent research from Johann Füller (CEO of HYVE and assistant professor at the University of Innsbruck) shows consumers’ motivations indeed determine their expectations towards the co-creation design. He highlights the differences between extrinsically and intrinsically motivated consumers as follows:

Proposed Impact of Motives on Expectations (Source: Füller 2010)

Results show that consumers engage in virtual co-creation for several reasons. He identifies six main co-creation motives:

• curiosity
• dissatisfaction with existing products
• intrinsic interest in innovation
• gain knowledge
• show ideas
• get monetary rewards

Cluster analysis further revealed that consumers differ in the motive structure that drives them to engage in virtual co-creation

• Reward oriented consumers (19,9%)
• Need driven consumers (26,3%)
• Curiosity-driven Consumers (27,8%)
• Intrinsically interested consumers (26%)

Cluster Means of the Four Different Consumer Types (Source: Füller 2010)

“The results indicate that, with the exception of reward-oriented consumers, monetary incentives are not as important for engagement in virtual co-creation. For participants, intangibles such as feedback or recognition as well as the interaction experience itself are amply rewarding. … Monetary rewards may be necessary, especially to avoid the impression that a successful company is ripping-off consumers’ creativity for free, but they are not sufficient if other incentive mechanism like feedback, recognition, or compelling experience are missing. The asserted legal rights should also be taken into consideration when determining the amount of the monetary compensation.”

As I said earlier and similar to Johann’s implication, I think monetary rewards are a very important aspect of co-creation in that case as it shows the company’s attitude, recognition and commitment towards collaboration with external stakeholders. Attractive rewards signal that the company doesn’t want to exploit consumers but appreciates the effort that participants invest and the (potential) value that their submissions can create. Nevertheless, if the intrinsic motives are not addressed and the interaction and resulting co-creation experience is not perceived as rewarding the project will fail. As I wrote in my prior post, I think rewards in terms of monetary and non-cash prices will become a more important factor that signals the ethics and commitment of the co-creation initiator (Necessary condition). But the commitment and quality of interaction between the participant and the brand will create a rewarding co-creation experience and valuable outcomes (Sufficient condition).

Implications:

• Different types of Co-Creators have different motives and expectations
• Extrinsic, monetary rewards are not the dominant driver of co-creation, but act as hygiene factor signaling the firm’s ethics and commitment towards co-creation (Necessary condition)
• Commitment and quality of interaction between the participant and the brand will create a rewarding co-creation experience and valuable outcomes (Sufficient condition)

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post What drives Co-creators beyond monetary rewards? appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Ethics in Social Media Research – the privacy debate

In the market research community the discussion about data privacy and guidelines for social media research (mainly focused on listening) is peaking right now as ESOMAR, CASRO, MRS and other Market research associations have published their guidelines recently. This debate is crucial as behaviors like that of Nielsen Buzzmetrics scrapping data from patienslikeme.com, a closed Online Community on health issues, can create distrust against a whole industry. I think a discussion of ethics in Social Media Research is crucial. But that doesn’t mean I agree with everything written in the recent guidelines. And I am not the only one. A rising number of market research authorities reject and question these guidelines. For example Ray Pointer states in a recent blog post that “in several areas, ‘new’ market research is at odds with the traditional guidelines. Examples of where NewMR is at odds with the traditional ethics includes: the brand-related incentives for members of communities, the brand advocacy of community members, the changes wrought by deliberative research, and most of social media monitoring research.

Other areas where research is drifting away from the classic model of anonymity include a growing amount of customer satisfaction and most of enterprise feedback systems.” So Ray is making the point that “If market research companies abide by the old ethics, in particular anonymity and informed consent, they will not be able to compete for business in most areas where market research is growing. This is because there will be no commercial benefits that will accrue to sticking to rules and ideas that nobody else does.”

While I am really curious to see where the debate is going, I don’t want to concentrate on the privacy debate in this post. For everyone interest in the discussion I recommend to follow the public forum debate on Monday, August 22 at 12:00 EST, hosted on the MRGA 365 Virtual Event Platform http://www.marketplace365.com/registration/mrga365/

Ethics in Co-Creation – the exploitation debate

I want to share my thoughts and start a discussion about another important area of ethics in Social Media, which I think is the way we integrate and reward people in co-creation and crowdsourcing projects. There is hardly a debate on this yet from an ethical point of view, as “Co-Creators” seem to be willing to share their ideas for free or relatively low money without real commitment from the company running the initiative. But in the long-term this might change! Here is why.

#1 Co-Creators will become more selective and demanding

Happily consumers seem to love the new way of participation with companies. Last year Forrester Research asked US online adults if they want to co-create with companies. Here are some results:

• 61 percent of US online adults would consider providing input to help companies design and build new products or improve existing products (“Willing Co-Creators”).
• A majority of these “Willing Co-Creators” would participate in a co-creation engagement regardless of the product, brand, or service involved.
• 30% of “Willing Co-Creators” would only participate in co-creation efforts with their favorite products and brands.
• In 12 of the 17 industries that were included, more than half of the “Willing Co-Creators” expressed interest in co-creation engagements.

So there seems to be a reasonable number of “Willing Co-Creators”. But as the number of companies that involve consumers in the development of new products will continue to grow – as I am convinced that Co-Creation is here to stay – Co-Creators will become more selective and demanding in choosing the initiatives they want to take part in. Thus attracting Co-Creators will become harder for companies. A “War for Co-Creators” – similar to the “War for Talent” might start. Attracting the most creative and/or skilled “Co-Creators” or Lead Users (see the Lead User Method) for co-creation initiatives aimed at creating breakthroughs will become the most competitive area.

The competition will force companies to spend more effort on co-creation advertising/recruiting as well as to increase the co-creation value they offer in terms of outcomes and interaction/co-creation experience. According to social exchange theory, consumers would only participate in co-creation activities because they expect that doing so will be rewarding. But For individuals, tangibles such as goods or money, as well as intangibles such as social amenities or friendship, are rewarding. Further, not only the outcomes, but also the interaction experience itself may offer a benefit.  Thus, to make participation in Co-Creation a more rewarding experience companies need to really understand consumers’ motivations to co-create and incorporate this into their campaign design, the interaction/co-creation experience, the reward system and last but not least the company’s commitment to a co-creation initiative.

Implications:

• Be strategic today to succeed in the coming “War for Co-Creators”
• Increase co-creation value to attract Co-Creators
• Understand Co-Creators’ motivations and expectations in terms of outcomes and interaction/co-creation experience

#2 Monetary rewards as necessary condition and signal for ethics and commitment

So if the competition for Co-Creators will be more intense and we will have to increase the rewards to attract the most talented Co-Creators, how should we do that? Of course increasing rewards should include more than simply increasing monetary prices. As stated above it is about increasing the value of co-creation for the participants in terms of outcomes and interaction/co-creation experience.

But I think monetary rewards are a very important aspect of co-creation in that case as it attracts extrinsically motivated people AND it shows the company’s attitude, recognition and commitment towards collaboration with external stakeholders. Attractive rewards signal that the company doesn’t want to exploit consumers but appreciates the effort that participants invest and the (potential) value that their submissions can create. Furthermore you could argue that a company that spends a reasonable amount of money on a co-creation project is serious about it and really wants to act upon your input.

Non-cash prices, brand-or ideally project-related ones are at least as important as money. Project-related rewards, like for example a visit of the headquarters and a meeting with the team behind the project can even help to build stronger relationships with Co-Creators.

Giving Co-Creators a platform to get feedback, recognition and visibility can be very rewarding for Co-Creators. Companies making their Co-Creators famous and involving them in their communication activities offer an additional value dimension to Co-creators and profit from authentic storytelling and increased advocacy and word of mouth activities.

Mc Donald’s “Mein Burger” campaign involved the winners in TV commercials:

Tchibo Ideas give co-created products that come to market a face by also showing the Co-Creator in their catalogues:

Implications:

• Monetary rewards attract extrinsically motivated co-creators
• Monetary and non-cash prices will signal ethics and commitment
• Non-cash, ideally project-related, prices can build relationships
• Recognition and visibility of Co-Creators ads value for Co-Creators and Companies

#3 No long-term engagement without real commitment

I think that in the long-term a company’s commitment for a co-creation project makes a big difference in the “War for Co-Creators”. I want to elaborate a bit on what I mean by that. I deal with open innovation, co-creation and crowdsourcing for more than 4 years and I think I know most of the prominent crowdsourcing and co-creation cases. But I only know a few products on the market that have been co-created and marketed as such (e.g. Vitaminwaters, Dewmocracy, Walkers chips, Tchibo Ideas, Quirky). There might be a number of reasons for that like ideas that weren’t technically feasible or the estimated market potential and/or profitability didn’t fit internal criteria. But I think one major problem is that companies struggle to open up and to change culture and processes. They still experiment and often have no commitment and no defined follow-up process to bring co-created ideas to market. This might become critical in at least three aspects:

• Image: Opening up without real commitment and follow-up processes that result in commercialization will lead to a sour taste of co-creation. Consumers might start to call co-creation or crowdsourcing campaigns without commitment “crowdwashing“, meaning that companies proclaim to be open but don’t act on consumers’ ideas. More demanding Co-Creators that can choose between different co-creation initiatives probably won’t choose a “crowdwashing” one (and in case they do, they won’t do it more than once).
• Reward: The most rewarding experience is going to the supermarket and buying “your product”.  Co-Creation and crowdsourcing activities that offer this potential reward will especially attract potential lead users. Lead users have very high requirements that are not served by existing products. Thus the chance to actually use a product that solves a current problem is very rewarding for them.
• Advocacy: The Dewmocracy campaign or Mc Donald’s “Mein Burger” initiative shows impressively the energy and activation power a committed crowdsourcing campaign can generate in terms of storytelling and word of mouth activity.

Attracting co-creators and building Long-term relationships can only work if companies move away from “crowdwashing” and show commitment to their co-creation activities. Especially to build ongoing relationships with the most valuable Co-Creators and Lead users requires commitment, as they won’t continue to invest their time and passion if there is no real commitment by the company and if they think their product will never be on the market.

Implications:

• Company’s commitment drives Co-Creator’s engagement
• Crowdwashing has negative impact on image and long-term relationships
• Commitment attracts Lead Users
• Commercialisation drives advocacy

Conclusion: Being successful in the “War for Co-Creators” by “sharing rewards and risks/efforts”

When thinking about Co-Creation in the long-term I think involving hundreds or thousands of consumers and paying three of them relatively low monetary prices might not be a sustainable business model, or at least not the most promising one. I prefer to think of Co-Creators as partners. That’s why I like Roland Hardwood’s simple definition of open innovation, which is: “Innovating with partners by sharing the risks and the rewards.”

Keeping this in mind you might argue that the risk and effort of consumers participating in crowdsourcing or co-creation projects is very low, so the rewards are also rather low. BUT if the war for co-creators starts companies will need to increase rewards to attract them. By increasing monetary and non-monetary rewards, showing commitment and giving Co-Creators recognition and visibility the effort and commitment they bring into the co-creation process can be increased as well. Making co-creators part-time, co-creation partners will give you more valuable input (= insights, ideas, feedback) and drive advocacy (=awareness and sales effect through word of mouth) throughout the innovation and commercialization phase.

I see huge potential in a co-creation approach, where rewards are shared to a certain extent, based on the risk/effort and potential value of the contributors. A committed co-creation project with a reward system that lets Co-Creators earn points for all the contributions they make, based on the related effort and value, allows not only to reward innovation activities but to reward advocacy and word of mouth activities of the community even during and after launch. The rewards might even be based on a percentage of sales in the first year after launch. This is already done by Quirky, a social product development company and one of my favorite cases for a co-creation business model. The UK-based Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) GiffGaff takes a similar approach and rewards their community members’ support and advocacy activities. But even more traditional companies like Walkers, which business model is not based on their community, rewarded the winner of their crowdsourcing campaign with 50k and 1% of future sales.

To sum it up, I think Co-Creation has to be fair for both parties and should avoid to be perceived as doing crowdwashing or exploiting consumers. Companies should design their co-creation initiatives as sharing rewards and risks/efforts. Companies signaling that they are fair, by offering attractive rewards, showing commitment and giving recognition and rewards to Co-Creators’ contributions will do pretty god in the coming “War for Co-Creators”.

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Be prepared for the coming ”War for Co-Creators” appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Online Activism interview with Greenpeace Social Media Team

The organisations that will succeed will use their available resources to discover people who care about the same things they do and bring them together to achieve shared goals. Charities demonstrate the model. The cause-related enterprise, the belief-driven business – an organisational model which places the customer at the heart rather than at the end of the line. Belief delivers life-long and inter-generational affinity, passionate activism harnessed for common goals. Open Business Council interviews Laura Kenyon from Greenpeace and goes through these topics.

Interviewed with Greenpeace’s Laura Kenyon

Laura Kenyonis the Digital Communications Specialist at Greenpeace, whose use of social media has caused some of the largest companies to reverse their policies whilst knocking size-able figures off their share-value. If you haven’t seen any of their work check it out. I’ve listed some in the ppt above.

openbusinesscouncil.org: What you think the consequences of social media are to corporations today?
Greenpeace’s Laura Kenyon: Just as corporates are establishing large social media presences, activists are also establishing online spaces to hold them to account. Social media empowers people and amplifies their voices – this can take the form of demanding change from corporations whose business practices or policies are environmentally destructive. Corporations need to be accountable to society and their customers, and therefore they need to listen, respond and engage with people’s desire for a green and peaceful future – both online and offline.

openbusinesscouncil.org: How do you see your role and that of Greenpeace in this context? 
Greenpeace’s Laura Kenyon: Greenpeace aims to be an agent of change, we want to enable people to demand a better world and social media helps us do that. Millions of people have been able to participate in our campaigns online, and the personal actions of a motivated online supporter base were vital to successes such as Nestle’s commitment to changing its palm oil sourcing policies, or Apple’s agreement to remove toxic substances from its products.

openbusinesscouncil.org: What conclusions do you make for the future?
Greenpeace’s Laura Kenyon: Greenpeace will maintain a strong presence in social media – using the latest tools and communication channels where it is effective to challenge those who are involved in environmental destruction. We hope to empower more people to have civil courage and to amplify their voices when they speak out against injustice or for a better world. We are facing huge challenges in the environmental movement and will need every person and every tool available to us to keep moving forwards. Social media will no doubt continue to have an important role to play.

Many companies will and should be worried by this language. It may cause them to shift more spend into social media to combat it. But there is no company with enough money to beat the voice of the Internet just like there is no Government powerful enough.

So this is the new reality large companies are facing. But its clear the opportunities far outweigh the challenges. This is no longer about spending your way to a better reputation. It’s about building a better company – with your customers.

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Open business: Online Activism interview with Greenpeace Social Media Team appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Open Business Council platform have just begun phase 1 of the its Co-creation Project. Open Business Council is a Pan European organisation with a global reach and network that wants to create anm active development of solutions and reflection towards the practice of Open Business.

Open Business Council is actively contacting and recruiting a varitey of professionals that have in common the passion for innovation and business. This invitation and contact will be done to international authors, university professors, industry leaders, international speakers who are thought leaders or passionated about the new directions of business strategy and thinking. Open Business Council wants to join together professionals and experts and discuss, create an action plan to answering the challenges overal business faces with the new development and future development of social media and continous digital environment in the broad concept of Open Business theory.

This invitation and contact is being done bearing in mind the goal to help develop the Project Framework including definitions and understanding of the discipline across:

Open Innovation,
Open Planning,
Open Research,
Open Data and
Open Communications
Open Government

These areas will serve as a clear and common dictionary / direction for all Council members.

If you would like to be involved please register here

or send us a mail to editor@openbusinesscouncil.org

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Project Framework: Phase 1: Creating a Council for Open Business appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

Research is critical for business. The systematic investigation about what is necessary for a given business, product, audience is something that any organisation needs to bear in mind, namely in a social media world. This can also be done though a concept of Open Research: a study of materials and sources in order to establish facts and reach the necessary conclusions about business.

Open Business Council in the ever increasing competitive landscapes, blurring and with bigger consumer demands is working and defends an open business approach with focus in agility. This is the only way for business’ capability to adapt rapidly and cost-efficient to that landscape and its target audiences. This is a critical area where the enablers – social media and co-creation – fuel business agility through continual innovation.

Social media as a doorway for opening up business

y using social media as a doorway and opening up business, entities that actually force/create the changes in demands are involved, to swiftly act and react with them and their intelligence. This applies to any supply- and value chain. When speaking about intelligence, this can be consumer insights (their needs and current experiences, market intelligence and competitive intelligence.

As resources spend in digital peer-to-peer environments rise, it is necessary a rapid and consequential change in the digital and social marketing way of management for organizations. Business needs to be open and to take control – to get serious with his propositions and efficient. The organization as a whole: infrastructure, work flows, stakeholders, technologies and so on, needs to be reconfigured and enhanced where needed for cost-efficient and effective social media usage. As soon as as the groundwork has been laid, it’s time to bring in the continual innovation process.

Continual innovation as the driver for business

Continual innovation “may be the most powerful of any competitive advantage for a business. It creates game-changing breakthroughs. Along parallel lines, bit by bit, it also tweaks improvements in existing products, chips away at costs and debugs processes — in every corner of the company, all non-stop. In a turbulent business environment like today’s, it’s essential for helping a business move from playing defense to playing an aggressive, and winning, offense.” Take this and overlay it with social media and co-creation, real-time consumer insights that can be extracted, molded and poured back into the right supply chain.

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Open Research: consumer demand and business agility appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.