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  Michael

  9 months ago

  Thanks for the post Jordan – great to see those illustrations!
  
  You have given Social Capital Opportunity a slightly different take.
  
  Towards the end of the paper, I speculate that building connections where none exist (even when that connection is not talking about you) may indeed be good strategy. I think you have highlighted this speculation.
  
  In the paper, I was thinking of the existing Social Capital Opportunity at the point of valuation. No connection or engagement, no opportunity. The audits are designed to sort out who is talking about the corporation and its products and then who the corporation is already connected to.
  
  "Social Capital Opportunity – Identities discovered during the Social Identity Audit are then searched for matching identities from the Social Engagement Audit. These matches provide the sum Social Capital Opportunity (SCO)."
  
  You have correctly jumped to the general deduction. If there is a difference between the Social Identity factor and the Social Engagement factor then one way to try to stabilize future earning is to go out there and build connections with the folks who are talking about your company that you are not connected to. Note: The actual best strategy would be subtle. You would be looking for the "best" new connections. I.e. the one who are not talking about you that are prone to deliver positive results for you and the ones who are talking about you and prone to deliver positive results and some form of engagement with the negative ones that is designed to mitigate their bad results.
  
  Alot of this seems a bit obvious, so why am I getting more "wordy" about it? I talk a little bit about the motive in this post about brand shibboleths: http://memeticbrand.com/2008/08/15/teenage-beer...
  
  There is a need to put this into language and a framework that is consistent with the most senior levels of management and investment. The big idea here is that perception is reality. Perception now has a trail of artifacts on the web that is an accurate snapshot of what people are thinking about your company and products. An analysis of this can tell you much more about the stability of your company's future earnings than traditional brand valuation.
  
  In any event! I can't believe that I am rooting around in the weeds when the point is … THANK YOU! Yours is the first post to tackle the valuation method and to begin a real dialogue about it. Even most of the post that I have written are about introducing the idea and talking about the general merit of taking the time to read and share the paper.
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