Perhaps the greatest virtue of postmodernism is that it has taught us how to combat an overly-used slogan by inverting it. Consider the Cluetrain Manifesto. It is as easy to chant "markets are conversations" as it was for Orwell's sheep to chant, "Four legs good; two legs baaad!" This is not to devalue the insight beyond all recognition. As the Wikipedia entry points out, this really boils down to a healthy historical appreciation of the marketplace. Unfortunately, cheerleading based on slogans has little time for history; which is why the cheerleads occasionally need a healthy postmodern kick in the rear.So, consider this, conversations are markets! The lesson of history is that conversation used to be an integral part of the delivery of goods and services. While it is all very well and good to talk about the power of the Internet to enable conversations, what has actually happened is that IT has disabled conversation from the domain of customer engagement, leaving nothing behind but the linguistic deception of "customer relationship management!" Now, in fairness to the Cluetrain founders, the verb form of "engagement" does rear its head in Thesis 45. This is an appropriate and powerful Thesis, even if many of us recognize it as an "insight into the obvious." Unfortunately, in the age of the short attention span, one can only wonder how many of the cheerleaders ever get as far as Thesis 45!
The real point however is that we have become so starved for conversation that we are willing to pay more for it. We still have old-fashioned instincts that prefer dealing with a salesperson who "knows the stuff;" and that knowledge emerges from our conversations. The same goes for dealing with a service representative who can do more than read from a script. In other words the power of the Internet to enable conversations really does not signify unless we can have the conversations we need when we need them, and there is no doubt that one can build a market around satisfying that need.
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