The Tipping Point of Enterprise 2.0
Tuesday: June 19, 2007 6:41 AM
They call it the tipping point which a phrase popularized by Malcom Gladwells’s book called The Tipping Point. In social terms, a tipping point is the event where a previously rare phenomenon becomes rapid and dramatically more common to the end user community. For Collaborative and Social Software this rare event is actually utilizing the software for more than a curious glance. It is more along the lines of truly replacing the business functionality and creating a defined value add. The following figure shows three specific events: flat line, tipping point, and sustained growth. The flat line is the area where the utilization of the software is rare. Be careful during the flat line period because it is easy to get confused when or if you have reached the tipping point.
For example, suppose after four months you see a sudden increase in growth. In fact, you see three months of double digit growth which might indicate that you are on your way. Only then do you see a complete slow down in the utilization of the application. When your adoption is low, it’s very easy to think your past a tipping point when spikes appear. How can you tell the difference between a false positive and the real tipping point? Looking backwards, it’s very easy. From the chart presented above you can clearly see when it happened. Of course, that’s like playing Monday morning quarterback. Some of the symptoms include that your self-service orders or end user created collaborative environments outpace your business development orders by about four times. That is to say that end user momentum of your current customer base out weighs you new business development customers by 4x. You should also have a market penetration of at least 40% which means that 40% of the enterprise knows that the collaboratiev or social service exists. Remember, people don’t use social software due to political, social, communication, education, and cultural issues.
Once you get past the tipping point then the sustained growth should carry you through to the mass adoption you told executive management you were going to get. You will still need to increase your business development and ensure you have market penetration. That being said, it’s better to be in a growth market versus one that hasn’t taken off yet.
They call it the tipping point which a phrase popularized by Malcom Gladwells’s book called The Tipping Point. In social terms, a tipping point is the event where a previously rare phenomenon becomes rapid and dramatically more common to the end user community. For Collaborative and Social Software this rare event is actually utilizing the software for more than a curious glance. It is more along the lines of truly replacing the business functionality and creating a defined value add. The following figure shows three specific events: flat line, tipping point, and sustained growth. The flat line is the area where the utilization of the software is rare. Be careful during the flat line period because it is easy to get confused when or if you have reached the tipping point.
For example, suppose after four months you see a sudden increase in growth. In fact, you see three months of double digit growth which might indicate that you are on your way. Only then do you see a complete slow down in the utilization of the application. When your adoption is low, it’s very easy to think your past a tipping point when spikes appear. How can you tell the difference between a false positive and the real tipping point? Looking backwards, it’s very easy. From the chart presented above you can clearly see when it happened. Of course, that’s like playing Monday morning quarterback. Some of the symptoms include that your self-service orders or end user created collaborative environments outpace your business development orders by about four times. That is to say that end user momentum of your current customer base out weighs you new business development customers by 4x. You should also have a market penetration of at least 40% which means that 40% of the enterprise knows that the collaboratiev or social service exists. Remember, people don’t use social software due to political, social, communication, education, and cultural issues.
Once you get past the tipping point then the sustained growth should carry you through to the mass adoption you told executive management you were going to get. You will still need to increase your business development and ensure you have market penetration. That being said, it’s better to be in a growth market versus one that hasn’t taken off yet.
