Nominations Are Now Open For The 2009 Forrester Groundswell Awards

May 29th 2009 Posted to Marketing, Social media

My colleague Josh Bernoff just blogged the opening of the 2009 Forrester Groundswell Awards. The entry forms are now live and waiting for you! The big change this year is that we are now taking B2B entries as a stand-alone category. So, if you have a great social media implementation or a client you are proud of we are looking forward to your entry.

Here are the instruction courtesy of Josh:

“For the third year in a row, we will be recognizing the most effective social technology applications at the Forrester Groundswell Awards.

“I have to say, these awards are one of my favorite things. First of all, the people submitting entries really care about the work they did and spreading the word about it. Second, the applications we’ve gotten the last two years were fantastic — creative, effective, and clever — and they make it easier for me to tell the story of the power of social applications. And finally, I think it’s great that anyone can win — whether you’re Accenture or Starbucks or a tiny credit union in Alberta, Canada.

“So, starting now you’re free to submit an entry for the Forrester Groundswell Awards. The submission form is here. If you’re going to enter, we strongly recommend that you read the Forrester Groundswell Awards Rules before submitting your entry. You can submit each entry only once, and once submitted, you cannot modify it.

“We’ve added a new twist this year, too. We’ve divided the categories for the prototypical groundswell objectives (listening, talking, energizing, supporting, embracing) into business-to-consumer and business-to-business. And we’ve added a new business-to-business category, “spreading,” to recognize social applications in which you sell ideas or products to employees of a company, then get them to sell others at that company. We’ve still got the category for pro-social applications (“social impact”) and applications within an enterprise (“managing”). That’s 13 categories, folks, so while I expect even more entries than the 150 we received last year, there are more ways to win.

“A few key facts to remember.

  • Be smart. Read the rules first.
  • The entry deadline is September 2, 2009. But the earlier you submit, the more time people will have to review and vote on your work. (If three months is not enough time to prepare, you’ll have to wait for next year.)
  • On your own site or elsewhere on the Web, create a “My Forrester Groundswell awards submission” page or document describing your application. Also include a single screenshot that represents the application.You’ll need to put these into the application.
  • Only submit your own work. Agencies and vendors can submit work they do for clients, provided they have obtained permission from the client. (This is your responsibility, please don’t embarrass yourself in front of the client by posting without getting permission.)
  • Anything in these submissions becomes on the record. Submissions go live immediately and are open for ratings and reviews.

“If you are a winner in the business-to-consumer, social impact, or managing categories, we’ll present the award to you in a new, expanded awards ceremony at the Forrester Consumer Forum 2009 in Chicago on October 27 and 28. We’ll be having a nice party for all the attendees of that event, so they can meet and learn from the winners. We’ll be awarding the B2B awards separately.

“Go ahead. Impress us. Enter your application. We’re looking forward to it.”

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When Bad Design Happens To Good Companies: Garmin Edition

May 28th 2009 Posted to Customer Experience, Travel

When I moved to San Francisco from Boston about a year ago the biggest change was not the weather, the food, or the hills, but the commute to the office. In Boston it took me about a half hour to walk to work across the Charles River via the Mass Ave. Bridge and through MIT’s main campus. In San Francisco it takes me about a half hour to drive down Van Ness to the 101, and down the 101 to Foster City, where Forrester’s main Bay Area office is inconveniently located (public transportation is unfortunately about a 1.5 to 2 hour ordeal, since the office is no where near CalTrain or BART).

Needless to say, this new set-up required a car, and I had not owned a car since high school — a red 1976 Impala station wagon, in case you were wondering. Like many Americans I embraced the freedom of a car and decided to go full bore and get myself a GPS for easy navigation to client sites, weekend get-aways, (eventual) cross-country drives, and alley trapping. The Garmin Nuvi 660 was the big winner and I have been pleased with the purchase. One of my favorite features has been the built-in traffic; the device has saved me from getting stuck in several major jams. However a couple of months ago the traffic subscription expired. Since I had been impressed with the results so far I decided to plunk down the $60.00 to get traffic for life.

This is where the trouble began . . .

Like many companies Garmin has a handy online purchasing process for many of its services, so one afternoon I grabbed my GPS, headed to my computer and set out to update the subscription. I was moving along quite nicely — I had found my device in their list and had found the traffic service — when I was surprised to see step 4 (below).

GPS? Check. Power source? We’re plugged into the computer so, check. Turn the key in the ignition . . . umm, my computer doesn’t come with an ignition.

Garmin FormAfter a few moments too long of dumbfounded staring I realized that Garmin either expected me to have an internet connection in my car, or I was to go to my car, find the receiver unit ID, and come back to input it. Now, I’m not a lazy man, but I was very close to packing it in right here. Since I live in San Francisco and park the car on the street, the trek to the car is not as simple as stepping into the garage and turning on the car. For me this meant first remembering where I parked, and second walking up and over Russian Hill — a brief aside, never try to park in Russian Hill unless its 10AM to 4PM Monday through Friday.

After completing this task I returned to my computer, continued my way through the process, handed over my credit card, and was presented with my next obstacle: a 16-digit HEX code that needed to be input back into the GPS once I returned yet again to the car.

Well, dear reader, you should be happy to know that I survived, and once again receive traffic updates on my GPS. Despite my triumph I couldn’t help but wonder how many others were less fortunate, and fell out of the process along the way and, further still, how much that cost Garmin in lost revenue. So, I decided to do a very rough back of the envelope calculation (most numbers are conservative guesses):

Estimated 2008 Device Sales: 18 million
Percent that are traffic enabled: 20%
Traffic enabled devices in 2008: 3.6 million

Percent of people with traffic devices that would pay for traffic: 10%
Potential traffic sales: 360,000

Percent of people who drop out of the online form: 10%
Lost purchases: 36,000
Lost revenue at $60 per purchase: $2.16 million

What would be the cost of at least informing me I would need to make the trip back and form to my car, or telling me what I would need before getting started? My guess is nothing at all.

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