Empower or lose power

A thought paper on the age of

democratic consumerism in
modern business and politics

Photo from
wiredbike on Flickr

Chris Quigley, Director, Delib Ltd

December 2009
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A shift in power
Getting feedback from your customers isn't enough anymore. Letting your staff have
their say as a token gesture doesn't wash. Customers, employees, citizens don't just
want to be heard, they want to be involved - or at least have the opportunity to be
involved. And if you don't provide that opportunity they'll do it themselves - and
make noise doing it.

So, say hello to the new era of "democratic consumerism".

In the last few years there's been a fundamental shift in power from the organisation
to the individual; a power shift driven by technology and amplified by social media.
The good news for organisations - whether you're business or government - is that
this power shift is an opportunity rather than a threat.

The empowered consumer provides the opportunity to improve and innovate. The
empowered consumer isn't interested in second-rate service, or products that are
*good enough*- they want the best. The empowered consumer is there to keep an
eye on your front-line staff. They're there feeding back on how your service and
products perform. They're there coming up with new ideas on how to improve what
you do - "Have you thought of using organic only ingredients?" "How about providing
a discount for military personnel?" "What about providing open source software as
standard on your new computers?" “Have you ever thought about providing patient
passports in hospitals?”

The empowered consumer is also there to become a mouthpiece for your organisation
- an advocate spreading the good word. On the flip-side they're also there to criticise
you when you get things wrong.

Doing it in public
Perhaps the scariest aspect of this new phenomena of democratic consumerism is that
all of this participation is done in public. It's done by people sharing their thoughts
and experiences across blogs, Facebook and Twitter. The public nature of this is
naturally quite a challenge for most organisations, however it's something that can't
be stopped so the best option is embrace rather than ignore.

Companies who get it

Good examples of companies making the most of their empowered consumers aren't
as many as there should be. Over in the US, Starbucks and Dell are the poster boys.
Both run similar customer collaboration services – Dell with their “Ideastorm” and
Starbuck’s with their “My Starbucks Idea” - where customers are invited to share
their ideas on how to improve products and services.

The key to the success of these online communities is that they’re not just talking
shops, but effect real service change and product innovation. To date, Dell’s

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Ideastorm community has generated over 12,000 ideas and of those Dell has
implemented 386 ideas. That’s 386 improvements to Dell’s business, given, and
mandated democratically, by their own customers for free. I’ll say that again – for
FREE. And it’s not only the value of these ideas that’s important, it’s also the value of
the process itself. The sheer fact that Dell not only listens, but also acts is truly
empowering to its customers and changes the whole customer / company relationship
model. In short Dell have created a truly participative company - a company with a
unique relationship with its customers.

Government that gets it

In the US, Obama’s administration are using the power of crowd-sourcing to improve
government – from policy development to service innovation. When the White House
wanted to develop a new information hub for Recovery.gov earlier this year they set
up a ideas sharing website to crowd-source ideas from the tech community on how
best to implement it – where ideas from the likes of Sir Tim Berners Lee were ranked
and rated alongside ideas from bedroom coders from Texas. As when it comes to
crowd-sourcing, it’s not who you are that counts, more how good idea your idea is –
creating a true democracy of ideas.

Playing catch up in the UK

In the UK, we’ve been slower to embrace notions of policy crowd-sourcing and
consumer empowerment. However, in the last few months there are signs that we’re
slowly catching up. In the political sphere, last week the Conservative Party loudly
launched their first crowd-sourcing exercise to gather ideas for their Making IT
Better policy. The wider public sector’s moving a little bit slower.

To try an ignite some innovation in the public sector, last week - whilst lying in a
hospital bed - I launched a new NHS crowd-sourcing service called “Help us Improve
Kings”, allowing patients of Kings College Hospital (the hospital where I was) to share
ideas of how to improve patient service. That’s what I call proper patient
empowerment - delivered directly from a hospital bed!

In the private sector, UK companies are also starting to embrace the idea of
“democratic consumerism” with Asda dipping its toe into this field with its “Your Asda”
scheme – an online community who are given a say on future purchasing decisions.

Undoubtedly the best example of a business wholly embracing the empowered

consumer is the peer-to-peer loan company Zopa.com whose whole business model is
based around customer participation.

But why aren't more companies and governments embracing democratic consumerism
like Zopa.com? Well, in short because it requires a significant culture shift and strong
leadership and most execs and senior civil servants don’t have the vision. Having said
that, just this morning (Monday 7th December ‘09) Gordon Brown had his “Open Gov

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memo moment” replicating what Obama did earlier in the year by announcing his
vision of “third generation government” which was built around citizen empowerment
and participation.

And if Gordon Brown gets this citizen empowerment thing, then the Execs of the
FTSE 250 can’t be far behind . . .

Useful links
www.Mystarbucksidea.com
www.Dellideastorm.com
www.thenationaldialogue.org
www.helpusimprovekings.org
www.zopa.com

About the author

Chris Quigley is co-founder of e-democracy company Delib
(http://www.delib.co.uk). Delib is a leading provider of online
consultation, opinion research and debate tools, helping UK,
New Zealand and US government organisations to
understand, engage, and connect with their citizens.

Delib is particularly proud to partner the National Academy of

Administration (NAPA) in the US, providing the software for
several successful National Dialogues including work for the
Department of Homeland Security and other US Federal
government organisations. www.thenationaldialogue.org

Delib is a UK company (based in Bristol and London) founded

in 2004. Delib US (based in Washington DC) is planned to
launch in the next few months.

You can reach Chris at: chris@delib.co.uk / +44 (0)7710 145575

Copyright Delib Ltd, Co.#5158056, registered at 35 King Street, Bristol, UK, BS1 4DZ. www.delib.co.uk