Internet and social networking have decisively changed personal relationships between consumers and companies. Doc Searls, co-author of the Cluetrain Manifesto, believes we are entering a new era where consumer’s intent will be the big economic stimulus. The era of client driven innovation.
This means that, in an Intention Economy model, consumers will come to companies with their ideas, demands, proposals and requirements. This will drive the direction of that companies innovation, otherwise the client will perceive that company as unresponsive to his needs.
In an interview with the Harvard Business Review to discuss the book in which he develops this theory (here is a link to amazon for The Intention Economy: When Customers Take Charge, 2012), Searls talks about how customers formulate requests for proposals directly to companies, encouraging them to meet their needs with new developments, utilities and even services. Here is the link to the HBR article.
The Intention Economy and client driven innovation
His book is ultimately about the potential impact of consumers expressing there needs directly to those who wish to service them.
This represents a significant change from the model inherited from the Industrial Revolution in which manufacturers were the dominant force in the market. As the consumer adopts modern social communication tools his ability to tell the market providers what his needs are increases. This is undoubtedly forcing companies to be more creative, to invest in innovation and to be attentive to all the ideas they receive from outside their corporate structures.
For more information on these concepts, here is a video of the “European Identity and Cloud Conference”, in which several speakers (Craig Burton, Scott Burton, Marcel van Galen, Drummond Reed, Phil Windley and Doc Searls himself) discussed in detail the concept of Intention Economy.
This video is an hour long.
