Group 3 discussed The Cluetrain Manifesto.
From this discussion we agreed on four salient points found in the book relating to Com546:
1. Customers are now part of a connected network (over the Internet.) These customers are talking to each other more than in the past.
2. Businesses need to talk in the language of thier customers, not in P.R. (public relations) language.
3. E-businesses will thrive when they understand and meet their customer’s needs in the networked world.
4. E-commerce has gone full circle form open conversation (the ancient marketplace) to controlled conversation (Industrial revolution top down consumerism) to open markets once again (in the Internet age.)
We also hit upon two intriguing ideas in The Cluetrain Manifesto:
1. Companies can gather knowledge from within by facilitating an atmosphere of open conversations.
2. E-business allows consumers to return to personal interaction with the seller much like in the markets of the past.
The last thing we discussed was the historical positioning of The Cluetrain Manifesto.
To put it simply:
The Cluetrain Manifesto is positioned at the beginning of large scale adoption and use of the Internet during the late 1990’s.
