Community mindset

The ecosystem economy is here

Businesses can no longer grow in isolation. Their customers expect a seamless experience, based on a deep understanding of their goals and needs. Delivering customer success is dependent on how well businesses integrate, and co-create, with their partners and other stakeholders.
#communitythinking #communitymindset

What is your strategy?

A community is a group of people who want to grow together, where organizations and individuals interact for greater value. It is a very dynamic system in which participants are constantly in movement, where boundaries shift continually to achieve sustainable value and growth.

This triggers interesting strategic considerations. Who is my audience? Should I build my own community, or participate in one? How do I monetize my community? Do my partners, stakeholders want to contribute to my goals? Do I understand my customer or buyer journey across the value stream? Is my organization or culture dynamic enough? How does my product strategy enable my community strategy? What should I do, and what should I leave to others? How open should I be as an organisation?

The dynamic nature of the community means that these questions have to be answered over and over again, in increasingly faster cycles. The way to deal with this, is to fundamentally shift the way organizations approach the world. It is by adopting a community mindset.

Adopt a Community Mindset

Use these 3 core principles to adopt an community mindset and to be successful in this new economy.

1 Organise trust to grow

It all starts with the understanding that in a business context you can only exist with the right balance with your surroundings. Communities, in the end, are about trust and about human connection. It is about choosing co-creation over isolation and community value instead of shareholder value.

This value is created through collaboration across the entire ecosystem, with customers, partners, suppliers and your own organization. To achieve this, organizations need to orchestrate trusted conversations and focus on a fair exchange of value to grow together.

2 Live the customer journey

Customers always choose the path of the highest value and least resistance. They are individuals with their own goals and context, and expect a seamless experience which deliver the quickest gains to them. A deep understanding of your customers and stakeholders is key to being a valuable contributor to the ecosystem.

Organizations need to deeply understand all stakeholder relationships and identify the customer drivers, gains and pains, revealing challenges and unlocking business opportunities.

3 Adapt, don't be rigid

To successfully get value out of a community, your organization, your product or service needs to be prepared to adapt to the ever-changing dynamics. It needs a clear strategy on how to build and monetize the community.

This requires a modular approach to your organization, technology and design which is tailored for adaption and ready to enable you to jump on the next business opportunity.