It turns out that ice cream and VRM, or Vendor Relationship Management, have a lot in common. VRM is like the truck that drives into Scoopville in this video.
Here’s a video by Rob Knight that explains VRM pretty well. The whole idea behind social media and VRM is that it empowers people. You and me, our friends, our relatives, people we don’t know, and even people that also represent companies. It’s about people, and it’s about time.
Coaching Moment: Do you use social media like MySpace or Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, or Flickr? There are many more, but you don’t need to use them all. The current set of sites and tools aren’t for everybody. What’s the worst thing about the current “social media” tools? Each one is proprietary, so you have to find and connect with your friends in each one. What a pain! Think outside the box. What would your ideal network do for you?
Note: There are two conference coming up next week that deal with topics of VRM and Identity. I’ll be blogging both. Stay tuned for updates!
There’s a good chance that you’ve signed up for several online accounts, and now you have several different online identities (user names, passwords, and search and purchasing histories). If you use social media tools like LinkedIn or Facebook, Flickr, and Twitter (there are so many more!), you probably spend time socializing and sharing information online every day. One person, many identities. That can be a problem.
Today’s social experience is disjointed because consumers have separate identities in each social network they visit. A simple set of technologies that enable a portable identity will soon empower consumers to bring their identities with them — transforming marketing, eCommerce, CRM, and advertising. IDs are just the beginning of this transformation, in which the Web will evolve step by step from separate social sites into a shared social experience. Consumers will rely on their peers as they make online decisions, whether or not brands choose to participate. Socially connected consumers will strengthen communities and shift power away from brands and CRM systems; eventually this will result in empowered communities defining the next generation of products.
I’m particularly interested in one of Owyang’s Five Eras of the Social Web:
4) Era of Social Context: Personalized and accurate content
There is a lot of work being done in this area, giving the power to centrally control and keep accurate information about ourselves. One name for it is “user-driven services.” I’ll be writing more on this very empowering concept in posts to come.
Coaching moment: if you were to collect all of your information in one place then selectively share some of it with various online services, what would that look like? Think about all of the data (searches, emails, tweets, posts, etc.) that you’ve generated this week. Which ones are you happy to share with the public forever? If not everything, what would you protect, for how long, and why?
Chi.mp (pronounced like the monkey) is a content hub and identity management platform that has two unique twists. First, you can get a free .mp domain that is portable, meaning you can install that domain name–and your contacts–elsewhere if you wish (though there are reasons you may not wish to). Second, they have a contacts management system in development that will allow you to implement layers of identity according to categories that you create and assign to each of your contacts.
Where do your contacts come from? They’re imported from many of other existing accounts, like Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail, and Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr. In fact, once you’ve identified certain accounts (Twitter, Flickr, Facebook) you can display your “feeds” (what you’ve posted on your other accounts) on your chi.mp-hosted page.
For example, check out Rob Farrow’s site (farrow.mp/). Rob is the VP of Marketing and brand czar for chi.mp. I don’t think he’ll mind if I use his site as an example here.
The left column shows tiny icons for Rob’s contacts, and below that is where to find him on the Internet and how to reach him. The right column starts with a brief bio, then shows where Rob has been active lately (his feeds). The feeds are listed according to when he posted them, so if he drops a picture on Flickr then tweets it (on Twitter), his feed column will reflect that.
Unlike Vidoop and Verisign Labs, chi.mp does not offer a function to manage everyone else’s passwords. Chi.mp takes the position that you won’t need all of these passwords as they’ll all be replaced by the ability to login using your OpenID. Your .mp domain is your OpenID.
Chi.mp is currently in beta, so getting an account (domain, access to their contact import and management tools) is limited. If you’re interested in getting hooked up, sign up to be notified when that becomes possible.
![[del.icio.us]](http://digitalidcoach.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/delicious.png)
![[Facebook]](http://digitalidcoach.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/facebook.png)
![[LinkedIn]](http://digitalidcoach.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/linkedin.png)
![[Ma.gnolia]](http://digitalidcoach.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/magnolia.png)
![[Technorati]](http://digitalidcoach.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/technorati.png)
![[Twitter]](http://digitalidcoach.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/twitter.png)
![[Email]](http://digitalidcoach.com/wp-content/plugins/bookmarkify/email.png)
