We have just received news of a new household recycling programme being introduced by local councils across England and Wales.

Funded by an EC grant to help the UK increase the percentage of household waste that is recycled a local council official stated that they would be using the first 6 months as an educational period of time but thereafter on the spot fines would be imposed.

The council official refused to confirm or deny that the process would allow car number plates to be tracked back so video would be put on YouTube as part of a 'name and shame' programme.

What with 14 million CCTV cameras already in the UK it does seem excessive to now have mobile crews at recycling plants!

See http://www.flickr.com/photos/adrianjmoss/sets/72157600291863746/

So how is it going so far? Steve O'Hear of ZDNet interviewed Shane Richmond of MyTelegraph.

What is really interesting is the age range of participants (10 - 80+) and the large number of 50+ who are active. Over 3000 people have started blogging in just 2 weeks - many for the first time ever. Of course once posted many people comment and so the conversation 'ripples' out.

Compare that to the traditional 'letters to the editor' which is ponderous and very restrictive.

Scary headline!

This seems to be the conclusion of research by Croner as reported by the BBC. The essence of the story seemed to be that employees risked being sacked if they put ‘derogatory or damaging’ comments in their personal blogs.

Out of 2000 people surveyed 39% said they made ‘harmful comments’.

The report uses legal speak from a spokesperson at Croners to explain the situation – ‘if there is a negative impact...that...breaches the implied term of mutual trust and confidence, the employee could be dismissed..’

Possibly true but employers need to be concerned about how they deal with personal blogs by employees too. Take the case of Catherine Sanderson. Employed by an English company in France she had a private blog which did not reveal her real name, nor her employers name. She did occasionally write about aspects of her office job and the company. Her employers dismissed her in mid-2006 for damaging the company’s reputation. She took them to a tribunal. She won her case earlier this year and received a years salary as compensation.

Now before making a post like this I always access the source material and read it. Then I put some personal comments on it based upon my personal experience. What I wanted to do was understand the questions that were asked. What was considered ‘harmful’? As the Sanderson case proved, ‘harmful comments’, can be a matter of dispute. I also wondered if bloggers were doing this despite a company having a blogging policy?

The BBC report had no source reference so I went to the Croner web site. It is a rich content site. The area listing reports and research contained no mention of this research so I used the web sites ‘search facility’ and entered various combinations of words. Up popped something called ‘Bloggy hell!’ Unfortunately it was a summary and not a detailed report so I sent them an e-mail asking for more details.

The point Croner wanted to make was that blogging should be treated like e-mails and be included in the contract of employment and employee handbooks with appropriate training where necessary.

This is exactly what companies have done that encourage employee blogging. They see it as an extension of customer engagement. They have guidelines and training programmes in place for anyone who wants to blog. For them they want their employees to act as ambassadors for the company. With that objective and attitude it is far less likely that employees will deliberately set out to damage the company.

Great post by Eric Schonfeld showing what video sites are hot or not.

Recent research has shown that the profile of people using these sites is changing. The most recent from HitWise has shown that the 55+ are now the second largest group online.

For marketers this is a growing medium. We have done some test campaigns with clients and the early results are encouraging. For minimum extra cost a large group of people can get to see the message. The challenge is to turn those people into prospects by encouraging a call to action and providing your contact details. So rather than simply sticking a corporate video on one of these sites treat it as if it was direct response TV. Do the following:

• Edit it with the audience in mind (this is not a corporate ego trip but video direct marketing)
• Engage, entertain and inform the audience (don't video the CEO to camera in the hope that some people will be interested)
• Add you web page and telephone contact number clearly as a 'watermark' or caption at the start and end.
• End with a closing message and repeat the web address/phone number
• Consider realising a 'video short' and drive people to your web site to watch the video in full
• Drive them to a 'video microsite' and have other videos listed so after watching one they may look at another
• Provide RSS feeds so they will get updates when you make more

For some clients we have got a ROI of less than 50p per view. Now compare that to the cost of getting a brochure or flyer to them. One client wanted to use video podacsting as a virtual client new product presentation. Although for them the cost-per-view was over £20 they were comparing it to the time taken to make and attend a client appointment. This they calculated the cost at £250 per visit. For them the video podcast became a valuable part of the prospect lead qualification process. Analysis showed  video podcast viewer was a 'warm prospect' who was quicker to convert to an appointment. The sales person still needed to make the sales call but their productivity improved.

Lucus Films has decided to release a series of clips from the Star Wars film franchise and allow people to create 'mash-ups' (allow people to edit as they see fit). This is a big change of stance from previously where they would legally persue all un-authorised edits for copyright breach.

They will still retain some element of control as all films loaded onto their site have to be vetted. They want avoid pornography or anything that will tarnish the brands value.

As their spokesperson states this is simply accepting what many fans want to do (and have continued to do unofficially). It is also a very clever piece of marketing. No further films are being planned. By allowing this they will get big publicity on their 30th anniversary and help keep the franchise fresh and alive.

This follows a trend in much of the media to add citizen generated media and interactive web sites.

I have just heard that Manchester is to equip some of its traffic wardens with mini video cameras so they can record incidents in real time using a video stream technology. Shades of JustinTV*. This will be then used in evidence for prosecution if required. They will be clearly on display so avoiding any issues with Data Protection legislation.

Salford are at the leading edge of traffic management and recently were caught painting ‘no parking’ lines under a legally parked car (see here) so they could issue a ticket to it. One has to admire their creative ideas at generating additional income.

Now being a video production company we know you can easily edit digital video. Does this mean Salford will be hiring a team of video editors so they can increase prosecution rates and increase revenue still further?

For those of you with a Monty Python vision of a traffic warden with a plate sized video camera attached to their head think again. Video cameras are about the size of a thumb nail.

In the UK we have the highest density of CCTV cameras in the world. I think I heard it was 1 camera per 14 people.

Does make you wonder.

PS: If Salford want help with video editing we have a lovely studio in Southamton.

Today should be a happy day in our household. My daughter has just finished her finals at University and is back home after 4 years away at Bristol. The inevitable wait for the results and job searching after a few days off I guess.

This morning I read an e-mail. Someone I knew well had died of cancer. It was a double shock as he is the same age as me and had always seemed so full of life. It was made even harder as he was part of the founders team at Lotus software (1-2-3, Symphony and Notes).

As a start-up it seemed to energise our lives. We shared a vision and so worked and played hard. We had a lot of fun even if we set ourselves a big task to change the world. It became a special group of people. Something to look back on years later and say ‘I was part of that team’. So much so that as a group many of us stay in touch and get together once or twice a year.

It will be our 25^th anniversary in 2 years time. People are coming from Australia, New Zealand and America. Sadly David will not be among them. We will have fun and tell stories. A few about David too so I guess he will still be with us after all.

Recent research by Hitwise has shown that the 55+ group are set to replace the 35 – 44 year olds as the largest share of internet users.

The report shows that money matters, travel and news are the most popular sites visited.

Based upon my own personal observations of a number of people in this age group this is what they are using the internet for:

• E-mail - keeping in touch with kids, grandkids and family
• Digital picture sharing - sending/receiving pictures
• E-commerce – on a budget this group can be savvy purchasers so they use comparison sites to rate products and compare prices. Many still then purchase in the High Street but increasing numbers are then buying online.
• Travel – cheap flights and time rich they want to ‘see the world’ before getting too old so are putting a package of hotels and flights online. The better off are cruising.
• News – keeping in touch is important and more are using this rather than newspapers as an information source
• Hobbies – many have interests to keep the active mentally and physically and they will visit targeted web sites
• Financial information – many track stock markets or other financial news as they are focussed on their pensions and income as they are retired, semi retired or close to retirement

Question: What goes from zero to $1.6b in less than 21 months?

Answer: YouTube

Check out this intersting video and potted history http://mediatedcultures.net/ksudigg/?p=108

Interesting article over at Podcasting News showing the growth in iTunes consumers, their affluence and why they are of such a great interest to advertisers.

Research Highlights:

• Males 63 percent/females 37 percent.
• 18-24 year olds represented 29 percent of the audience and very active podcast consumers.
• 35-54 year olds represented half the audience and were active podcast consumers. 

In the last 12 months we have had about 100,000 people listen to our own and our clients podcasts (mix of audio and video)

What we have found is that 75% of consumers choose the 'play now' option and 25% use RSS feeds. Where we offer feeds via iTunes it is only used by 10% of the audience.

For us we will continue to work with clients and offer feeds in multiple formats.

Talking to consumers we do see a growing interest in in 'smart phone' and mobile content delivery. The challenge for all content producers is to design the programme delivery to suit all platforms.

A great post by Jeremiah Owyang over at PodTech.net but on a number of levels misses what I feel is the main corporate issue with the whole area of social media – management of information that has the potential to damage the company reputation or relationships in some way.

The problem with the diner party conversation analogy he mentions that human beings when communicating face-to-face rely on less than 10% on the words themselves and mostly use non-verbal clues. You can see when someone is uncomfortable, upset or amused by what you say and immediately retract or edit it.  Live performers and presenters are able to pick-up on this and interact with the audience. On the phone we lose visual clues but by really listening we can pick up audio clues on how our message is being received. When we know someone very well we can even sense when things are not 100% by their general behaviour. How they are standing, looking, breathing and the pause before they say a word - long, short and what sort of pause? Everything helps carry the real message. The words may not.

Written communication carries very few signals and so it leads to all sorts of misunderstandings. Heck – the legal profession earns a fortune in litigation fees sorting out written contractual obligations.

The biggest problem with blogs is their very power. They get distributed far and wide very fast and how it is written is just as important as what was or was not written. Trying to retract a post is not like withdrawing a comment made in a conversation. Once out there RSS feeds and WOM marketing distribute far and wide. You can pull the post but it is out there gaining momentum. Readers will look at this and re-act accordingly. If they do or do not do something as a result of reading a blog who is potentially legally liable? The other day Apple’s stock suffered a $4b drop because of a rumour (later found false) that the iPhone had been delayed. It started from a ‘leaked’ Apple internal e-mail. How many people sold Apple shares as their value dropped or even bought because they dropped? What if an Apple employee had blogged this rather than a 3^rd party blogger? Would Apple be liable? What if Apple executives have an automatic buy or sell setting with their brokers based upon a certain price? How many people would feel Apple were guilty in some way of engineering the fall to get shares cheaper or minimise losses? Certainly in the UK that would be classed as potential ‘insider trading’ and trigger an investigation by the authorities which would cost the company a damaged reputation and probably further share value decline. What a mess and it all happened in minutes due to the power of blogs and the internet.

Companies as legal entities have responsibilities (many legal) to all stakeholders – employees, shareholders, the local community, their industry and business partners and financial investors. Legally they are obliged to disclose certain information in certain ways at specific times. Other times they are not supposed to be mentioning anything financial as it is in the 'quiet period' before an earnings statement.

There has to be guidelines. I agree with Jeremiah that if control is too tight it risks killing the conversation but equally if it is a free-for-all it risks killing the company or certainly its reputation.

Jeremiah uses the phrase Air Traffic Tower. He avoids using the 'C' word - 'control' as he is concerned the blogging purist community will be unhappy. I am not so worried. Society need boundaries and controls. His suggestion is good as you need ‘best practice’ that everyone follows for the safety of all. Imagine if everyone could do what they wanted, when, where and how at the airport. A disaster waiting to happen? I don't know about you but I feel happier knowing someone is helping the pilot decide when and where to land, where to park and organising which door we exit by. I am also happy that Air Traffic tells pilots where to taxi and what run way to take off rather than just letting the crew pick and choose. I am sure the pilot and co-pilot will not endanger us deliberately but accidents do happen.

For large companies there has to be guidelines and policies on who can talk about what subjects and when. What is ‘off limits’ and why. It has to be clearly understood what the legal status and potential liability is of these comments (private or business blog – official view or private view).

During World War 2 this was a big issue for Governments. How to make local populations aware of the potential impact of ‘loose talk’ at diner parties and other social settings. From 1940 onwards massive poster, cinema and radio campaigns were undertaken (see extra posters).   

Companies that can embrace social media will see the value of this by increased engagement with employees and customers.  

The best company blogs I have seen are those where stakeholders have agreed guidelines, documented and published them and then trained people on them and general bogging skills and then moved out the way!

The three key words - authenticity, transparency and responsibility.

Authentic – real people talking about real issues and subjects. Not corporate HQ or PR agency speak.

Transparency – everyone understands the guidelines for posting and commenting – internal and external.

Responsibility – you live by what you blog and comment on and are covered/not covered by company or legal liability. Anyone who reads understands caveats.

A thoughtful post by Shel Israel on the world of CEO text blogging versus video blogging.

Coming from the world of corporate video and corporate communications I really think it is down to what platform the CEO is happiest with to ensure they really engage with their audience.

I have worked with some CEOs that were not ‘natural’ communicators. They looked uncomfortable and ‘wooden’ on a podium or in front of an audience but they were visionary and inspired and wrote wonderful e-mails, strategic documents and front pieces to the annual set of accounts. Of course with coaching and support they are able to pass muster but it does not feel right. You know what I mean. John Wayne had a flair for cowboy and uniform films. Put him in a modern setting and it just did not feel right.

Equally I have worked with some CEOs who leave all the detail to COO’s or CFO’s. They can ‘wow’ any audience – from VP to office receptionist – seemingly at the drop of a hat without any script. You can see that with politicians. Blair seems most comfortable in front of the TV cameras. Cameron too. Brown may surprise us but I bet he is most comfortable in small meetings and putting reports together. He seems ill at ease compared to others. Davis lost the Conservative party election as he just did not engage with the audience.

From the edit suite I can tell you ‘light editing’ may be possible but only on the basis that for some people we have had dozens of re-takes. They keep fluffing the line. Autocue I hear you say. Don’t be fooled – reading that without sounding-as-if-you-are reading-in-a-script-as-it-rolls-by in a non-monotone-voice is not as easy as it looks. Watch all those professional presenters fluff their lines so imagine what some executives are like. Having been through a few CEO recordings from hell I can tell you video is not for them. They will spend just as much time preparing, rehearsing and re-taking as it would have been to write a blog. Again coaching can help but somehow it often just does not sound or look right.

There is a half way house – audio podcasting. Many senior managers can articulate the message but without the pressure of a camera ‘staring’ at them and it takes them less time to than to write a blog. All they need as an outline topic script to make sure they hit their main points in a structured way. In fact some CEO’s record their blog and have it typed up with a light touch.

I have met Shel personally and had the pleasure of doning a couple of podcast recordings with him. I can vouch that he is a professional communicator – in the flesh, over the internet and in writing (check out his blog and book) but not everyone is so accomplished. CEO’s often need other skills to take them to the top.

CEO text blog, audio blog or video blog. It doesn’t matter. It’s the conversation and feedback that is important. Not having to time for the conversation is what worries me most about some CEO’s excuse for not doing anything.

Looking at all the research showing 50% of UK companies have disengaged employees you wonder if that starts at the top with CEO’s who are just too busy to blog or even communicate regularly with employees.

It is often difficult to qualify the value of blogging but here are some quotes from Dell who started to engage with boggers after it suffered terrible negative publicity over poor customer service. It was accused of ignoring peoples issues, being difficult to talk to and evasive in giving direct and honest answers. Frustrated customers started blogging about their unhappiness and some posted videos of batteries overheating and catching fire. Something Dell’s customer support teams did not respond to over the phone, e-mail or letter.

Here are some quotes from Dell2Dell, their company blog started in mid 2006 and how they see the situation

I can't speak for Apple, but I can give you Dell’s perspective. Media coverage isn’t the real issue—it’s really about our customers’ experience when they deal with Dell. No question that incidents of poor customer service resulted in bad PR for us. And it wasn't just Jeff Jarvis. Could we have handled that situation better than we did? You bet. For us, there wasn't an arbitrary tipping point—things were bad so we've tried to fix them and will continue to do so. In several of her posts, Laura has outlined Dell's ongoing efforts and investments to improve our customers’ experience when they need to contact us.

Beyond that, we've created a team to find customers needing assistance in the blogosphere, entered Second Life, recently re-vamped the Dell Community Forum and have plans to offer more options for customers to provide feedback at CES and beyond. 

This is the issue Dell was (is) facing. Look at what a customer blogger said they see as the potential negative impact if Dell did not listen. See how they have articulated the challenges companies face with social media and small interconnect worlds.

Me? If I am unhappy with dell and shop elsewhere, Dell will miss selling me probably 5 more computers in my lifetime, add in 5 for my wife too... (we won't calculate friends who learn of our nightmares and also choose not to shop Dell, the figures are too hard to quantify here), so no big deal in the grand scheme of things, BUT if they also lose (for example) my daughter, her friends, their friends, etc. they stand to lose a further 12 sales (for each person based on a purchase of one computer every 5 years) in their lifetime! On Facebook alone she has 162 friends! This should be setting off alarm bells across the board.

A popular video on youtube at the moment which is a parody of a well known pop song and is aimed at Dell has attracted 225,000 viewers. The video is also available at a number of other sites for which I don't have figures but it is easy to see the damage being done to Dell's reputation just from this one. Ouch.

So what does Dell think has been the value of them blogging and starting to use the blogosphere as a natural extension of customer service?

“…I can share with you that since we began entering conversations last August, the negative tonality of blog commentary on Dell has been reduced by slightly more than 50 percent. Is this improvement attributable entirely to our proactive blog outreach? Of course not. But we know it’s the right thing to do and that it’s making a difference.”

Disclosure: I have bought PC’s and desktops from a number of vendors over the years including Dell and Apple. I currently use a Dell laptop.

Looking at crime statistics it seems to be younger people who are the victims of crime more often than any other group. Cases of knife and gun crime may get the headlines but it is personal property theft, assualts and burglary that make up the bulk of the statistics.

West Yorkshire police have produced a series of crime reduction podcasts (six on the site so far) targeted at students. As younger people are the iPod and MP3 player generation seems a really smart move. The podcasts can be subscribbed to via RSS feed or played immediately as an audio file on any computer, MP3 player or 'smart phone' (often the very target of the crime!)

Looking at the podcasts some were produced last August and some December. Nothing since but it doesn't matter as the advice is 'evergreen' and will be as valuable next year as this. The style is straight talking and by the sound of it have real police - local accents and all - doing the talking. Showing the power of an integrated campaign they detail links to the police web site and extra information available. One also refers to the Crime Prevention roadshows that will be touring during what I assume would have been 'Freshers Week'. Again because it mentions things generically, without specific dates, it has not aged.

What is really great is that a number have been produced by students themselves. Advice from the police is fine but from a peer is even more impactful. On the podcast 'home page' reference is made to how students can provide content but sadly I could not find the details at the bottom of the page where it said it was (wonder if it was stolen? Sorry - bad taste joke I know!) Shame, a great idea to get students giving fellow students advice especially if they would be speaking from personal experience as a victim or near victim of crime.  

Becky Carrol posts about her great customer experience at Disney recently and it reminded me of ours many years ago.

As my daughters birthday is August 5^th we often ended up being away from home on holiday. We would carefully pack birthday cards and some presents so we could celebrate while away and open the rest when we got home.

One year we were at staying at one of the Disney hotels in Disney World, Florida on her birthday. After opening her cards and presents we went to the parks for the day. When we got back we found there was a card from the cleaning staff, another one from management and a Mickey Mouse Disney toy too. It was topped off with an invitation to join Mickey for breakfast the next day. You can imagine how an 8 year old felt. Mickey had pride of place in her toy collection for years afterwards and of course Disney products (books, toys, clothing, videos etc) were on her Christmas wish list for the next few years. She told all her friends who of course told their parents (talk about viral marketing!)

Looking back we spent a total of 6 birthdays in hotel/resort properties between her 4th and 13th birthdays. Yet only Disney took the trouble to notice the birthday cards and celebrate with her although everyone else could have done so too. Says a lot about the customer culture of Disney and the lack of it of those other companies.

In any vote for choice of next family vacation my daughter always pleaded to return. I resisted for a few years as there were so many other places I wanted us to see as a family. A few years later we did visit Disney again but not on her actual birthday and this time we tried California. We had a great time.  

At 18 she and a group of friends went off to the US before starting University. A couple of days in Disney was on the agenda of course. Graduating this year she is thinking of a holiday before starting work. The US is seriously being considered. If she goes she will almost certainly spend a few days in Disney.

Guess what? If she has kids I bet she will take them to Disney. If I get the chance to take the grandkids on holiday I bet I will be seriously considering Disney too.

So let’s recap from a business perspective.

In 1993 Disney invested 2 cards and a Mickey toy in us (don’t under-estimate the positive effect on me by making my daughter so happy). Total cost to Disney = $15. Within 24 hours we had bought extra Disney merchandising for my daughter and of son (could not leave him out could we). Total expenditure must have been $50. Disney recovered their initial investment within 24 hours.

Now add in the extra vacations on Disney property and merchandising over the subsequent years and we must get to an additional $2500+ spent.

That does not include what will be spent over the coming years with my daughter if she has kids and they go on a family vacation. If I get to take the grandkids you bet Disney will be a serious consideration. Let’s say another $2500 over the next 10 years. $5000 in total. Not bad for an initial investment by Disney of $15. And how many others over the years have we influenced by telling them the story?

Do you know what? I don’t begrudge a single $ we have spent over the years! I can still see my daughters face when she saw the cards and toy and how she looked when she had breakfast with Mickey the next day.

Making someone feel really special has that sort of effect. It lasts years. Perhaps a lifetime.

How will you make a customer feel special today?

PS: I am not even sure of the names of the other resorts and hotels we stayed in! I bet my daughter doesn't either.

I have just been contacted by Unicom, the organisers. An even more interesting line up with three additional speakers....

• Lee Bryant, Headshift
• Steve Bridger, nfp2.0
• Holly Stewart, IBM

The original line up:

Kevin Anderson, Guardian
Suw Charman, Open Rights Group and Social Software Consultant
Kurt Lyall, Tagseasy
Ian McNairn, IBM
Jim Moffat, Smith Ivanson elastictime Ltd
Adrian Moss, Focus Business Communications
Brad Meyer, Business Coach and Consultant
Lyndsay Rees-Jones and Ed Mitchell, CILIP [Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals]
Chris Vallance, BBC
Sam Watkins, BT

I have been asked to run a workshop at the NHS, South Central* Communication Professionals annual conference on 6^th June. My workshop is entitled ‘Exploiting Social Media, Web 2.0, Podcasting and its practical uses’.

We are going to try and record part of the workshop to podcast later to NHS South Central communication professionals unable to attend the conference and those based elsewhere in the UK.

The topics for the day are being built around New Media, Web 2, audio and video podcasting, webvideo and social media sites.

The NHS is the third largest workforce in the world so faces a real challenge in communicating effectively to its staff, patients and the public. This challenge is made all the greater by the number of changes it is going through under a public and political ‘spotlight’.

One of the biggest changes it is facing is the increasing requirement to use the professional discipline of marketing. This is driven by the move to Foundation Trust status, the introduction of patient choice and the introduction of private sector companies into NHS healthcare.

* South Central covers NHS Trusts across Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire, Isle of Wight, and Oxfordshire.

Interesting line up (exclude myself from that!) at the Unicom conference on Web 2.0 and Social Media tools being held in London on 11th and 12th July.

This will be third year running for this conference but the first time I will be speaking. The event is being hosted by Dave Gurteen which will be nice as I have known Dave for near on 25 years since we started at Lotus together.

The topics being covered over the 2 days are very comprehensive.

Key themes will include:

· How Blogs, Wikis, Social Tagging, Instant Messaging etc change the traditional models of managing knowledge and how they can support purposeful   social networks
· Google and beyond: advances in search engine technology and use
· Combining Video and Blogs for greater employee involvement
· Developing and maintaining communities
· Social Tools and the Not-for-Profit Sector: Overview of take up and measuring the impact
· Why IBM and other organisations are investing time and money in Virtual Worlds
· The use of podcasting and RSS feeds to target customers with clearly defined interests
· Twitter, Jaiku. Does microblogging have a role in business interactions?
· How to plan a strategy for encouraging use of social software in business
· Protecting organisational reputation in an open culture

Speakers:

Kevin Anderson, Guardian
Suw Charman, Open Rights Group and Social Software Consultant
Kurt Lyall, Tagseasy
Ian McNairn, IBM
Jim Moffat, Smith Ivanson
Adrian Moss, Focus Business Communications
Brad Meyer, Business Coach and Consultant
Lyndsay Rees-Jones and Ed Mitchell, CILIP [Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals]
Chris Vallance, BBC
Sam Watkins, BT

Disclosure: I am speaking on podcasting but am not being paid a fee.

The Telegraph reported that at the recent Internet World 2007 show Mark Howe, MD Sales, Google UK said that ‘Consumers are the new brand manager – they define the rules of engagement online, and brands need to engage with this change’.

Google estimates that direct searches for products via Google account for just 17% of sales.

Word-of-mouth/mouse recommendations via personal networks and social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace and Bebo and business networking sites like LinedIn generate the bulk. (For earlier posts on the concept and power of social networking see this category.)

Social networking or personal recommendation is not new. What is new is powerful social networking software and an increased willingness of people to share personal information online.

I am always looking for examples of Web 2.0 sites that illustrate the power of social media tools to help create and engage with a community.

Here is a great example from Josh Hallett. When you visit the site you will see an archive of photos covering the design, construction and testing phases of the theme ride. I am not sure if there are any there but I would have personally added video interviews (sorry if I missed them) with the design and construction teams and the work-in-progress. Lots of details have been provided about the engineering and the physical aspects of constructing and operating the ride. Just the sort of behind-the-scenes information loved by enthusiasts of all ages.

When the ride opens visitors will be encouraged to blog, take photos and videos and share these with other visitors through the community portion of the web site.

As with all new operations a period of time will be needed for it to really 'bed-in' to optimum efficiency. The visitors blogs I am sure will be full of valuable feedback on what is being done well and what can be improved. This can be added to all the traditional marketing research and testing that will be done and so provide a flow of both analysed data and 'raw' data. Great feedback.