The ideas around prosumerism – particularly around customer co-creation – appear to be becoming ever more popular with companies, even if the term itself isn’t widely used. In addition to the Dilbert example I like to open presentations with (and part II of that series is coming soon), there’s another graphic I like to use that seems to resonate well with people. It’s a riff on the Intel Logo most people are familiar with:
Now of course we are not suggesting that companies adopt this approach entirely – having only customers inside, and only talent outside, makes absolutely no sense. However, I find it useful for discussions because over the last decade or so many companies have become quite comfortable with the “Talent on the Outside” portion, via strategies like outsourcing, the use of ideagoras, etc. However, from my experience while lots of companies talk about things like “customer engagement”, they generally haven’t really thought through what “Customer on the Inside” really means for them. Is it simply about getting feedback? Word-of-mouth advertising? Integrating customers in the innovation process? What about testing (i.e. beta launches), or strategies built around customization and true co-creation?
There are a lot of different opportunities that companies can consider and pursue, depending on what there strategy is, when they start thinking about bringing the “Customer Inside”. And similar to how Intel did a brilliant job de-commoditizing themselves by having PC purchasers know that there is Intel inside, many companies may find they can similarly differentiate the experiences they offer by adopting some “Customer Inside” strategies.
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