How to raise online reputation: Notes from Tara Hunt's presentation on Making Whuffie (WebVisions 2009)

This was one of the better presentations at WebVisions. I felt like it had some pretty concrete actions to take.

Best takeaway: By putting myself out there for feedback on my company, the many benefits include gaining more followers, learning what my customers want, being able to engage in a discussion. I gain more by listening than by talking.

Making Whuffie
Tara Hunt

Blog: http://www.horsepigcow.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/missrogue
Book: http://www.thewhuffiefactor.com

• Dunbar number: 120-150 – the number of people we can really know at any point in time
• Will: based on tribes and communities
• As a result of the internet / we b 2.0 / facebook+myspace+blogs the dunbar number is raising
• This doesn’t leave room for the one way messages of corporations / advertising
• Some companies greeted enthusiastically, some companies are barfed upon
• Cory Doctorow / BoingBoing
• DOWN and OUT in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow
• In the science fiction future of Cory, instead of money, there is something that he called whuffie
• Roughly equivalent to social capital: reputation, access to resources, favors added up (reprocity), followers, levels of trust
• High whuffie score = good reputation
• You can buy stuff with your whuffie
• But… not really fictional or futuristic. It’s here and now.
• It’s how we decide to friend people on Facebook (based on looking at existing friend relationships)
• To raise your whuffie, you need to establish relationships and credibility
• 5 ways to raise your whuffie
• 1. Turning the bullhorn around: instead of just speaking, listen
• (Will: I wonder what would happen if I solicited input on HP printers and HP website)
• The silence will smack down your whuffie
• 8 ways to turn the bullhorn around
• 1. Get advice from experts, but design for the needs of the novice
• 2. Respond to ALL feedback, even when you have to say “no thanks”
• 3. Don’t take negative feedback personally: people want a better experience, they want to keep using your product/website, they are taking the time to give you feedback to make things better
• 4. Give people credit:
• mention contributions in blog posts, tweets, or videos.
• Name a product or feature after the contributor (or let them name it)
• Send journalists their way
• Send a gift certificate or special coupon code
• Schwag and schtuff
• Upgrade their account
• Give the contributor more responsibility
• 5. Point out and explain changes as you make them
• 6. Make small, continuous improvements
• 7. Go out to find your feedback
• Use Google Alerts, Radiant6, or similar tools to seek feedback
• 8. Ignore the haters (“Don’t feed the trolls”)
• 2. Become part of the community you serve
• Figure out who it is you serve
• What problem are you solving? For whom?
• Join the community… not for market resource, not to sell them something… to learn what makes them happen. And why they would give a damn.
• 3. Create truly amazing customer experiences
• Create love, joy, and laughter.
• We can design for them.
• Automagic: a user experience so seamless that it feels like magic just occurred.
• http://lilgrams.com
• Tag: “Automagically share your baby’s memories”
• GrowthGRam, StoryGram, FoodGram, WordGram
• Automagicness starts with sign: can signin with Twitter account or Facebook connect.
• You can sync up with your social network accounts
• And then pick people in those accounts who should receive notifications
• Estimates dates from EXIF data, and combines with child’s age to guess:
• First father’s day
• First solid food
• Etc.
• Quicken for iPhone
• Automagic spending update
• Automagic account update
• Automagic ATM finder
• Tripit
• “The best way to organize and share your travel plans”
• You forward your confirmation email, from any airline or travel service, and Tripit creates a uniform itinerary, accessible via web, print, or iPhone.
• 4. Throwing sheep: fun, lightweight activities that encourage participation, but don’t really do much else.
• FB: poking, “I like this”, twitter: nudging, virtual gifting, kudos.
• Makes it an easy way for people to participate, get comfortable
• Example: Dopplr:
• Personal velocity meter (silly and fun – people were twittering about it)
• Carbon footprint
• 5. lighten up: the ability to inject fun into the most serious & professional interactions
• Examples:
• funny 404 page errors
• 4. embrace the chaos
• The fear mongers: legal, public relations/corporate communications, IT
• Understand the need for security… but need to balance it with the need for openness… because that is what people are demanding. We are in a new era of building trust
• Benefits of embracing the chaos
• You’ll be better prepared for the unexpected
• You’ll join in the conversation that is already happening and be welcomed for this move
• It will bring the opportunity for collaboration
• It will make your ideas stronger that way
• In the old days, you had one chance to get the message just right
• Today, you have multiple conversations and iterations to build that message with your customers and audience
• Whuffie is part of the gift economy. You don’t hoard it, you give it away.
• What can you give away that won’t leave you broke?
• #5: embrace your higher purpose
• Do well by doing good: in the core of what you are doing, you are giving back.
• Example: Stonyfield Farms: makes good yogurt, but does good things for the world by doing it. Sustainable production, organic.
• Craiglist
• Think customer-centrically
• Take off your marketing hat, your finance hat, and step into your customers hat. What can you do for them?
• Look at the “not customer-centric” slide on slideshare
• Customer-centric is:
• You send customers to other websites
• You measure how many people refer their friends to you as success
• When budgets get tightened, you tighten operational costs (not design, customer support, etc.)
• Your only customer service policy is to do right by the customer
• Your customers are doing things with your product you never dreamed and are posting videos.
• Influencers are adding you as friends on social networks
• You work with your competitors towards better customer experiences for all
• Making new things accessible to people:
• Blogger (enabled amateur journalists)
• YouTube (enabled amateur videographers/actors)
• Flickr (enabled amateur photographers)
• http://Akoha.com: Pay It Forward Mission Card
• If you combine all of these five whuffie factors, you will become whuffie rich
• Leads to better word of mouth, repeat sales, customer loyalty
• Which leads to increase sales and profits
• Discussion…
• Q: How to staff up to participate in this?
• A: It’s everybody’s job. At zappos, everyone is empowered to be social. It’s not one person’s job, not one department’s job. It doesn’t mean spending five hours on twitter, it means being ambient.
• The big companies spend a hell of a lot of time internally focused. They spend so much time in meeting talking about stuff that doesn’t matter instead of going to barcamps, tweetups, or webvisions conferences.
• Q: You can’t have a top down mandate to achieve something like the Southwest airlines safety rap. So how do you achieve it?
• A: You can’t mandate it. You have to cultivate the culture. That takes time, it requires hiring the right amount of people, and it takes time to apply across the board.