The Intention Economy
When Customers Take Charge
By Doc Searls
(Harvard Business Review Press, Hardcover, 9781422158524, 320pp.)
Publication Date: May 2012
Categories: Marketing - General
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Caveat venditor—let the seller beware
While marketers look for more ways to get personal with customers, including new tricks with “big data,” customers are about to get personal in their own ways, with their own tools. Soon consumers will be able to:
• Control the flow and use of personal data
• Build their own loyalty programs
• Dictate their own terms of service
• Tell whole markets what they want, how they want it, where and when they should be able to get it, and how much it should cost
And they will do all of this outside of any one vendor’s silo.
This new landscape we’re entering is what Doc Searls calls The Intention Economy—one in which demand will drive supply far more directly, efficiently, and compellingly than ever before. In this book he describes an economy driven by consumer intent, where vendors must respond to the actual intentions of customers instead of vying for the attention of many.
New customer tools will provide the engine, with VRM (Vendor Relationship Management) providing the consumer counterpart to vendors’ CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems. For example, imagine being able to change your address once for every company you deal with, or combining services from multiple companies in real time, in your own ways—all while keeping an auditable accounting of every one of your interactions in the marketplace. These tantalizing possibilities and many others are introduced in this book.
As customers become more independent and powerful, and the Intention Economy emerges, only vendors and organizations that are ready for the change will survive, and thrive. Where do you stand?
Doc Searls is senior editor of Linux Journal, coauthor of The Cluetrain Manifesto, and one of the world’s most widely read bloggers. In The World is Flat, Thomas L. Friedman calls him “one of the most respected technology writers in America.” Searls is a fellow at the Center for Information Technology & Society (CITS) at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and an alumnus fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, where he continues to run ProjectVRM.
“This is a thoughtful, well researched book with a compelling thesis and call to action for marketers.” — Decision
“a brilliant piece on free markets and the Internet” — Linux Journal
“Do yourself a favor. Read The Intention Economy by @dsearls. It’s a very quick study in what VRM means for both brands and consumers.” — Business 2 Community (business2community.com)
“The fine distinction between consumer and customer is at the heart of this insightful look at how some companies, like Trader Joe's, are moving in the direction of the "intention economy," where the desires and needs of individual customers primarily determine what the vendors offer.” — Fort Worth Star Telegram
“it’s fun, insightful reading for anyone interested in becoming “self-actualized, liberated customers.” — SocialMedia.biz
“Finally a thoughtful, hype free book worth reading about digital marketing, the relationships we have with vendors, and a vision for a better future where we have greater control of our personal data.” — ZDNet
ADVANCE PRAISE for The Intention Economy
“‘Consumers have a right to exercise control over what personal data companies collect from them and how they use it.’ That’s the way the draft of the US Government’s planned Privacy Bill of Rights begins. If you want to understand what this really means, then Doc’s book is the place to start. In fact, if you want to understand anything about what’s really happening with customers, this book is for you. An excellent read.” — JP Rangaswami, Chief Scientist, salesforce.com
“Profound, far-reaching, and one of those books people will be bragging about having read five or ten years from now.” — Seth Godin, author, We Are All Weird
“This book provides a much-needed road map for a profound shift in global markets. Vendor Relationship Management will turn markets as we know them inside out. Searls, as the key architect of this new movement, provides a compelling view of both why and how these changes will occur. You cannot afford to ignore this book.” — John Hagel, Co-Director, Center for the Edge; coauthor, The Power of Pull
“From Doc’s mouth to vendors’ ears! Doc Searls describes the economy the way it should be, with vendors paying attention to individuals’ wants and needs. I see a few such business models emerging, and I hope Searls’s book will incite a rush of them.” — Esther Dyson, angel investor
“Deliciously skeptical of today’s business models, Searls paints a compelling picture of the future. And if you’re a business manager, The Intention Economy is essential reading. Think of it as an API for dealing with empowered customers. ” — Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D., co-authors of Extreme Trust: Honesty as a Competitive Advantage
“No one has a better sense of the changing relationship between vendors and the rest of us than Doc Searls. In The Intention Economy, he explains the networked economy and your place in it, whoever you are—buyer, seller, advertiser, user.” — Clay Shirky, author, Here Comes Everybody and Cognitive Surplus
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