I met Dave Balter, the founder of BzzAgent here in London yesterday.
He'd suggested meeting after reading my own fairly sceptical posts on Bzzagents. (John Moore, Tom Guarriello and Christopher Carfi have all been critical too.)
I liked Dave in person, and I give him a lot of credit for his willingness to converse with his critics ("engaging the resistance" is what I call that). We swapped stories and reflected on the way of the world, and I found out a bit more about his business.
I still have my doubts about some aspects, but I was impressed by the thoroughness with which Dave has implemented the idea. He's got 75,000 people signed up, and I was interested that he finds most of them are not taking up the reward points they get for their work. He's obviously doing something that appeals to intrinsic motivation. He's thinking of stopping the reward system, or swapping to making charitable donations which I think is a smart idea.
What Tom criticises is the motivation of Bzzagents in promoting products, especially if they don't declare their interests. I guess that remains in question.
But if I were a middle ranking marketing guy trying to get my head over the corporate parapet, I'd give serious thought to pruning my market research budget and/or my ad budget and trying out one of Dave's campaigns. Oh, and Dave produces more metrics than you could shake a stick at, for those who have a secret altar on which to worship the Lord of Measurability...
And yes, it would be better for a business to create products that generate their own buzz without having to "rent" their boosters. Then again, I get the feeling that you couldn't really get many of these folks to promote stuff they actually don't like (except for the odd nutter demonstrating "loyalty beyond reason").
And compare this to boring old market research, where you can spend thousands for some theoretical information.. whereas this way you actually get a ton of feedback and get to sell some stuff in the process.
Whether the world needs to sell more stuff... well that's a whole different question.
Dave's thinking of setting up in the UK, and wonders if it would work here.
[UPDATE] The guys at pc4media shed more light on intrinsic motivation for buzz/
[UPDATE]Some clear thinking by Christoper Carfi here
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Comments (8)
Just a "yes, and" to your noting my questioning of BzzAgents' motives. In addition, I'm concerned about the relationship distortions that arise from undeclared intentions. Not to belabor the point, if I'm out to surreptitiously convince you of something's "coolness" without you being aware of that intent, our communication, and relationship, is fundamentally inauthentic. More inauthenticity of this type (and the suspicions it will breed) is not what I think we need today.
January 18, 2005 15:39 Permalink for comment
I "tested" Bzzagent myself, just to see what it was all about and wrote about it on my blog (http://risleyranch.blogs.com/risleyranch/2004/12/more_buzz_about.html).
Like you, I'm on the fence about it, but I love the idea of Bzzagent awarding donations to charity rather than points. I haven't done anything with the points I collected.
January 18, 2005 18:52 Permalink for comment
Jeff, yes, I think awarding to charity in some way - would be good. I think they might think of ways to do it that do not relate directly to the success of individual campaigns; that might go some way to mitigating the problem Tom raises. I get the feeling BzzAgent are keen to accommodate criticism and still have a business that works.
January 18, 2005 19:00 Permalink for comment
Contributing to charity is great.
How does that deal with the fundamentally deceptive premise of the business? This is a business that has cleverly tapped into a modern social phenomenon (people's willingness to surreptitiously influence others in exchange for being recognized as "cool") that encourages deception. Using the proceeds for charitable ends seems besides the point.
Am I missing something?
January 19, 2005 05:06 Permalink for comment
Does this analogy fit?
BzzAgent is to ‘Customer Evangelism’ as Tele-Evangelists are to Christianity?
BzzAgent and Tele-Evangelists both are well-meaning, but they lack sincerity. Hmm, I need to think about this more.
January 19, 2005 12:24 Permalink for comment
Tom, you're quite right. Adding charitable giving would not legitimise a process that wasn't legit. It might be a red herring. I think I was groping for a way that would detach the tangible reward from the level of activity; so that there is no incentive to sell things other than natural enthusiasm.
Which then leaves the question of what I mean by natural enthusiasm.
I also realise that the 75000 Agents will not be doing the same thing. I wonder if a few zealots who are just buzzing as some kind of game or measure of influence are way outnumbered by others for whom this is just an elevated form of getting a free sample. Which doesn't strike me as such a terrible marketing practice in itself.
John says he needs to think about this more and I notice I've been thinking about it too. I'll probably post again to continue this.
January 19, 2005 12:44 Permalink for comment
I trust the "free sample" motive a little more, especially because people doing so might not be as reluctant to spill the beans about their incentive.
I'm interested as hell in this whole area, too, Johnnie, 'cause, despite my criticisms of BzzAgents, I trust nothing more than the passionate recommendations of someone who's found something that's really cool.
See, Kevin Kelly's CoolTools, if you haven't already.
http://www.kk.org/cooltools/
January 20, 2005 03:25 Permalink for comment
Tom, so it makes sense that the motivation of people who recommend things is of great interest to you, because recommendation is so important.
Like you, I find this area very interesting.
And Cool Tools looks a fun site...
January 20, 2005 08:55 Permalink for comment