On July 9, Melanie Notkin, CEO and Founder of SavvyAuntie, launched a community site in beta, SavvyAuntie.com. This site serves a unique niche - that of women (80% of the economy) who have no children of their own (50% of those) and still love children. Nieces, nephews from relatives and from friends, too.

Within an hour of her launch, Melanie had had site reviews published by none other than TechCrunch and Mashable. Eric Kuhn published the first interview at The Huffington Post.

I asked Melanie is she’s be willing to share a few more thoughts with me for readers and community members of Marketing 2.0.

A former interactive marketing and communications executive for global Fortune 500 companies, including New York Times Digital, American Express and L’Oréal, I met Melanie on Twitter. The great equalizer, if there ever was one. Anyone who still has any doubts about the value of social media should think about this for a moment. Where and when would I have met such a talented professional?

SavvyAuntie includes a social network, and other community-based resources like user blogs, expert blogs, activity guides and gift suggestions. By registering and filling out information about nieces and nephews, users get customized gift and activity suggestions. They also have the option of uploading information about themselves so that they can meet other aunts (and uncles).

I like how you described what you learned as a progression - the interactive world and how to reach and drive people online at NYTD, the value of membership at Amex, what women want at L’Oréal. Why a community and not just a web site? Was that a natural progression? What inspired you?

Melanie: In June of 2007, I dreamed of developing a modern online resource and community for cosmopolitan Aunts, just like me. After doing the research, I realized that there were tens of millions of us across the nation. There already was “community,” only no one had bothered to notice.

I never claim to be the uber-all-knowing Auntie. Most of the information I’ve learned about Aunt-hood over the years has come from my community of amazing New York City girlfriends and their experiences as Savvy Aunties. Over brunch, these Aunts in the City would ask each other: “What can I do with my 12-year-old niece who is visiting me for the day?”; “What should I get my twin nephews for their second birthday?”; “If I’m in a fight with my sister, how do I not see my nieces?” And so much more.

“Savvy Auntie” isn’t me. She’s what every Aunt aspires to be. The only way to get there is to connect with the other Aunts on the site. We are inherently a community. I am just providing a larger platform than a table for four.

Of course, it was important to have expert content on the site as well. We have about two dozen experts who write on topics from kids’ health to pop-culture for kids, all told from the Auntie perspective. But because we know our Savvy Aunties have a lot to add, there is also opportunities for members to comment and rate content, as well as add their own “Savvy” to the Auntiepedia application.. They can also submit their own Activities and share their advice in our Forums

I have already learned so much from other Savvy Aunties in the process of developing and launching this community. I cannot wait to learn more, and become that Savvy Auntie we all yearn to be.

You received reviews of your beta site within an hour after the launch from none other than TechCrunch and Mashable. As well, Eric Kuhn published an interview with you at The Huffington Post. Do you think this level of interest is also based on the fact that you are a very active member of social media? Have you had conversations with these individuals in the course of social networking?

Melanie: There are a number of reasons why we received online reviews of Savvy Auntie immediately after launch. First of all, no matter how much of an impression you make through your social media relationships, if you don’t have a product worth reviewing, it’s probably not going to get reviewed. The fact that it got reviewed is a tribute to the smart people at the outlets you mention above, who see potential in Savvy Auntie. For that, I am grateful on a number of levels.

That aside, I met Adam Hirsch, COO of Mashable, and Brett Petersel, Events Director at Mashable, at the Jeff Pulver Media Breakfasts in New York City. I met Eric Kuhn there on a separate occasion. Each one of them has been a supporter of me and my dreams as an “auntrepreneur” since our first meeting. These guys are men to watch in the social media world; while all only in their 20s, they have managed to carve out immense careers for themselves by being smart and generous with their network and their support.

While I never met founder of TechCrunch, Michael Arrington, in person, we did share a few direct messages via Twitter. And while I would love to say that that relationship helped with my placement in TechCrunch, it was his eagle-eyed blogger Calley Nye, who picked up and ran with the story, interviewing me the day before launch.

What should be known is that while these reviews at launch were a huge boost for the site, so are all the posts by bloggers I have met only through social media outlets, such as Twitter and Facebook. In fact, that’s how you and I met, Valeria. The support for Savvy Auntie on Twitter is so enormous that TwitScoop reported it was the most Tweeted phrase on the day of launch.

There is no doubt in my mind that my social media relationships, developed authentically in Twitter, on Facebook, in the social media industry, have helped make Savvy Auntie a success at launch. Savvy Auntie and me as its founder, were welcomed with open arms in the SM community. And I cannot thank everyone enough.

The site is designed to grow by community, which makes it great for the integration of wish lists and affiliate retail programs. As marketers, we know how powerful peer to peer recommendations are. Conversation is also an important component of shared experiences. Do you envision the site’s growth beyond commercial utility? In your interview with Eric at Huffington Post, you talk about capturing stories. Would there be opportunity for expansion into educational tools, for example teaching languages, or support groups for children with developmental problems?

Melanie: That’s a great question, Valeria. And, certainly, there are numerous ways to take our learning from the Aunt community and develop them into tools and resources that help and support the non-mom offline as well. There are no parenting guides for non-parents and we are hoping that Savvy Auntie becomes the resource for Aunts who not only want to learn from each other, but share as well.

We’ve built opportunities for this within Savvy Auntie from the start. The Aunthology, a section within Community where members can share stories about Aunt-hood, is where we hope to learn about many new perspectives on Aunt-hood from different cultures and points of view. Plus, every member is entitled to her own blog, where she can share her personal journey. Finally, because Community is built organically, we hope to gauge interest in various issues important to Savvy Aunties through our Forums and Groups. And since the site is free to join, there are no barriers for participation.

We’ve already been lauded by some who blog about children with special needs for taking care to include content about developing special needs nieces and nephews in our Expertise and Gifts sections. We’re so happy the word is getting out about that. We hope that Savvy Aunties will add their own experiences and their own tips on the site as well.

Aunt-hood, as a universal story, has really never been told. It’s too early to forecast what will come of it. But if there is a way to capture the stories and translate them into solutions for Aunts everyone, online and offline, we’ll do it.

***

Thanks to you, Melanie, the community is off to a great start. Learn more about SavvyAuntie at Melanie Notkin’s blog.

Supernova2008 just wrapped up this past week. If you’re not familiar with this conference, you may learn more at conversation hub. Last year, Umair Haque (Bubble Generation), Liz Lawley (Rochester Institute of Technology), and Jerry Michalski (Sociate) engaged the audience in a lively and insightful summary. You may watch the video that closes the interactive loop here.

As I listened to these passionate interpreters extrapolate from the experience, a few points jumped at me:

Access is ubiquitous - access to capital, relationships, resources.

Things get better the more people use them - these are betters, not goods.

All of your metrics are crap (they do not look at measures of devotion) - eyeballs and buckets don’t tell you the details about what matters and what’s going to be successful.

We don’t have a culture of getting good data - we have data filtered through the people who often have the least reason to give us accurate information.

Backchannels matter - at the event and to your business. If you’ve failed to engage, you will know because the backchannel will boycott you and join another conversation.

We need to pay attention to humans - we need to make things available to customers. They are people in their normal lives, not consumers, targets, or impressions.

Silence has value - we talked about how silence has a sound and a place at Conversation Agent last year.

Purpose beats profit - craft a strategy by who and why and bake that in the DNA of your business.

Your company can be a platform for customers to remix - firms are one economic component. The others are networks and community.

Plastic beats specific - today the economy is made up of plastic things. Things that can be duplicated and remixed and tweaked and hacked into in many ways.

If relationships are liquid, flows beat assets. How do you harness the power of these new forces for your business? Ask ourself, is there a DNA build underneath these technologies? How does what you do provide an experience, how does it make your customers feel? That is the component that is game-changing, not the technology.

The other week, I attended KOOZA, an experience in intense storytelling by Cirque du Soleil. It was the shortest two and half hours I ever spent - that’s because I invested them. My return was a full immersion in the passion and joy of the actors and athletes who shared the product of their love for the art of movement and skill. Plus one insight.

The Juggler

Who could not identify with someone handling multiple items at the same time? Let’s do five, then seven, how about nine? The speed and agility were truly impressive, I think I did not hear a blink in the tent. Yet, the most impressive part of the performance was the smile on his lips.

He was not acting as the juggler, he *was* the juggler. An expression of radiance and an act of love. The rapid-fire movements only added charm and elegance to his performance. There were no boring repetitions, just grace and enchantment.

Can you?

Can you look at your products and services in the every day routine with the same kind of attention?

Can you deploy the same kind of concentration while under pressure to deliver?

Can you display the same level of passion about what you do?

Then you are a creator - of product, price, place, promotion; of experience.

There is Love in Creation

In marketing 2.0 experience is key. When you open the door to conversation, what comes through is your stance, the smile on your lips, the belief in your mind, the love in your heart. That is the passion that triggers participation, inspires empowerment and leads to purpose, the four Ps of new marketing.

How do you learn to love the stuff you market? In the same way you learn to embrace the marketplace for the stuff you’ve got: by letting your customers be part of the action. They call it 2.0 for a reason - you are the second, they are the first.

[The Juggler is at about minute 5:30 of this 7:36 minute video]

In the beginning of March, a panel convened at Kent State University, OH, after the primary, to discuss how technology is empowering individuals to participate in the 2008 election. As The Strategist reported, new media experts included Matt Dickman, VP of Digital Marketing at Fleishman-Hillard and author of Techno//Marketer.

The conversation revolved around the implications of Web 2.0 on the political process. While the potential to connect with citizens is much greater than it has ever been, much of it remains still unrealized. The same rings true for marketers. There is still a frank conversation we need to have about getting mixed up in thinking that the platforms and media is as far as it goes.

That is still not far enough.

The capability and capacity for two-way communications have still not gotten us to truly connect with constituents - our customers. Closer, yes, but the availability is not yet there to make it a conversation. For that to happen it needs to be:

Personal - one-to-one

How do you reach your customers at a personal level? Technology can help us see what is important to individuals. How can you talk to your customers about what is important to them? Let’s be honest, if you cannot tell that your customer just dropped $5k in your store - and what they bought - you have a lot of system work to do. Remember that people should drive systems, not the other way around. Put the rules in place to run the right queries. An extension of that in Web 2.0 language is to know what your customers are talking about. Digital is pretty permanent.

Spreadable - one-to-one-to-many

Most ideas spread not because of what you said, but because of what others, peers and members of the population, said in response to each other. Today, there’s a global transparency, an ability to see different perspectives from remote geographies, that we never thought possible in the past. With the abundance of information, no one person can hold in their brains all the facts, so your customers build off each other, through stories. Stories are inspired by great experiences, by affinity. What’s your story?

Spontaneous

Just like the flash mobs. They can gather in minutes to support an issue, and be strongly organized around that, to then disband and reform around another issue at the drop of a hat. What holds these spontaneous demonstrations together, the glue, is passion for a cause - the opportunity - and inspiration from peers - authorities who have “social” capital. Anything can happen, anything goes, and unless you are prepared to move fluidly with the crowd, you may be run over. Are you developing a sense of your core? Many organizations (and politicians) have been caught short with their messages and desire to control them. How fluid are you? How good you are on your feet depends on having your feet on, and ears to, the ground.
____________

With all this at play, why would political candidates spend time rebuffing each other, when they could invest that time talking with you? Can you think of a good reason why marketers would want to do the same? The best wins are those of heart and mind.

The best way to win both is involvement, engagement. Make it personal, spreadable, and spontaneous. More and more, people do choose to vote with their wallets.

Maybe it’s time to retire the war metaphor from business and marketing. “Winners” no longer defeat the competition by battling them, capturing customer share, locking customers in or making them loyal. (Sounds like some sort of waterboarding torture done to customers.) The new metaphor may be tribalism.

Widipedia’s definition of tribalism: “Due to the small size of tribes, it is always a relatively simple structure, with few (if any) significant social distinctions between individuals… it is a precondition for members of a tribe to possess a strong feeling of identity for a true tribal society to form.”

In the book Consumer Tribes editors and university professors Bernard Cova, Rob Kozinets and Avi Shankar take a deep dive to examine how tribes work and possible implications to business and marketing. Here are a few highlights I found particularly interesting:

“The allure of the primitive, of the tribal, lies in its ability to arouse our desires and passions.”

The concept of a tribe is at the same level as that of entrepreneur and craftsperson. A craftsperson is a creative person who believes in a passion and transforms this into a business idea. This passion pushes the craftsperson to share ideas and emotions with other individuals sharing the same interest, thus forming a tribe.”

Takeaway: tribes need to be built around passions. If you’re considering a business community the first question to ask: how passionate are people on this particular topic/issue? If the passion exists, in what ways do people want to tap into the issue - learning from “experts,” sharing their experiences, helping others, simply being identified with the issue in some way? What business value might there be for us to be associated with this issue?

“The most potent tribes are built in the interstices, in the margins, on the fringes.”

Takeaway: some of the most thriving business communities are likely to be around issues that aren’t “core” to your value proposition or business strategy, but tap into passions on issues that are on the edges. If a goal is to engage customers or employees, we need to open up to those fringe issues that matter to them - vs. just the messages we want to convey. There may be more value sitting on the margins than anyone inside the company realizes. Also, creating “a” community may be a flawed strategy; perhaps a better approach is facilitating many tribes or communities around many issues.

“One of the most important ways in which members of a cool tribe distinguish themselves from mass culture is through an emphasis on authenticity….Authenticity is in any case a deeply ideological discourse that denigrates popular culture and privileges the exclusive.”

Takeaway: To really connect with cool people companies have to be willing to hear people talk about why the old ways and products are lacking (or worse.) Even if we’re hosting a community, people are likely to bash beliefs and products that we hold true. If we’re going after cool and innovative, we have to be prepared to hear the negative. Second, cool people want to be insiders and have exclusive access to information, ideas, and people. For companies, this may mean embracing smaller communities, where access and inside information is granted to the cool few. Once a community gets big and accepted by the mainstream, it may no longer be a community.

“Companies do not need to send totally coherent messages to the marketplace. Consumers fill in the blanks, and they often do a better job of colouring in the picture than marketers would do.”

Takeaway: Do we spend much too much time and resources trying to perfect messages? Perhaps it’s better to get our products and services out in the market and take a more iterative approach to branding and messaging, tuning in to what our tribe members have to say. This idea is similar to what Harvard Business School marketing professor John Deighton has said for many years, “Marketers offer brand ideas to the market, but those ideas don’t truly become brands until they are accepted, adopted and made over afresh as part of the lives of those who use them.”

Tribes, influence and persuasion

In thinking about tribalism, it’s interesting to go back to a Harvard Business Review article Robert Cialdini, author of Influence: The Science of Psychology, wrote in 2001, titled “Harnessing the Science of Persuasion.” Many of his fundamental principles of persuasion are also principles of effective tribes, social networks, online communities, and groups.

1. The principle of liking: people like those who like them. (Uncover similarities and offer praise.)
2. The principle of reciprocity: people repay in kind. (Give what you want to receive)
3. The principle of social proof: people follow the lead of similar others. (Use peer whenever it’s available.)
4. The principle of consistency: people align with clear commitments. (Make the commitment active, public and voluntary.)
5. The principle of scarcity: people want more of what they can have less of. (Highlight unique benefits and exclusive information.)

Cialidini had one other principle, which may not be relevant in a tribal culture: The principle of authority: people defer to experts.

Perhaps we do defer to experts. But who are the experts we defer to today? Aside from those we respect and trust in our various tribes, who do we listen to? And what are the implications to marketing?

War metaphors stunt problem solving

For starters, let’s stop using the war metaphor in marketing and think in new ways. Linguists have found that people who frame problems in a militaristic manner tend to have a limited perception of the problem and how to tackle it. As noted Berkeley cognitive linguist George Lakoff has said, “This is not language, this is the way people think.”

I’m thinking tribes. And you?