Lately I've been reading more and more about H2H, Human 2 Human communication. And the more I read about it, the more I feel there's a simple truth in it.
A lot of companies are promoting a proposition of a B2B, B2C or even C2C leader. They claim a position in one or both of these markets. Thats actually pretty smart. I believe that choices are a good thing. You need to make choices and follow through. This article isn't going to tell you any of these choices are a bad thing. This article is trying to tell you that I think the differences between B2B and B2C aren't that big as they are all floating towards H2H.
These days we're often working with persona's, user journeys and user testing. Everyone is shouting we need to include real users in our working ways. Good call. Ten years ago we imagined what people wanted to see or experience. These days we include users to understand what they need, want or expect. We have really embraced the user.
A human being has emotions. Frustration, joy, fear and so on. When you include the user into the design process you start including emotions. We want to avoid user frustration, we want him to have a smooth experience - hopefully with joy or a simple smile at the end of the line. Our communications are with this human, a real person we have identified and who has emotions and feelings.
Now we know we have a human we are talking to, imagine this: when you are the human, who are you talking to? Very often companies tend to express what they want to communicate about themselves or their service. Its often pretty clinical - one way traffic. When I am talking to someone else, for instance my neighbour, the talk goes back and forth between us. We both ask and tell about the stuff that's on our mind. And we listen so we can interact and respond to the other person.
When you're a company and you're only communicating your view, your perspective, the user isn't part of a conversation - he is only a receiver. So you have no idea if the user appreciates this or not - there's no interaction - like there is with me and my neighbour.
Now imagine being that company and start looking at yourself as a human too. How would you communicate with your user now? Are you spitting information at him or are you engaging with him and trying to find out how you can best service the guy? Are you offering interaction and engaging instead of just being a sender? I'd like to think so. And there we have H2H communications.
H2H will only become bigger I think. Apps and websites are becoming more personal all the time. We are able to show information that is only interesting for certain audiences. Its possible to not show information that isn't interesting to you. Because of the persona's, journeys and user research websites and apps are becoming more personalized all the time. We haven't seen the end of it yet, I can imagine this to become even bigger in the future.
Do I think H2H it replaces B2B or B2C? Maybe. Obviously there are differences between B2B and B2C, but you are and always will be working with people. So in a way I think its true, H2H is the future. I think it won't take long before the first companies are claiming their place in the field stating that they are into H2H communications.
And with that I have tried to make you see why I believe in H2H in just a few short paragraphs. Obviously there's more to it - but I didn't want this post to become too long. I read somewhere that a blog post should be short and to the point. ;)
Kind regards,
Corné
B2B, B2C, ...
A lot of companies are promoting a proposition of a B2B, B2C or even C2C leader. They claim a position in one or both of these markets. Thats actually pretty smart. I believe that choices are a good thing. You need to make choices and follow through. This article isn't going to tell you any of these choices are a bad thing. This article is trying to tell you that I think the differences between B2B and B2C aren't that big as they are all floating towards H2H.
User centered
These days we're often working with persona's, user journeys and user testing. Everyone is shouting we need to include real users in our working ways. Good call. Ten years ago we imagined what people wanted to see or experience. These days we include users to understand what they need, want or expect. We have really embraced the user.
Emotion
A human being has emotions. Frustration, joy, fear and so on. When you include the user into the design process you start including emotions. We want to avoid user frustration, we want him to have a smooth experience - hopefully with joy or a simple smile at the end of the line. Our communications are with this human, a real person we have identified and who has emotions and feelings.
Corporate voice
Now we know we have a human we are talking to, imagine this: when you are the human, who are you talking to? Very often companies tend to express what they want to communicate about themselves or their service. Its often pretty clinical - one way traffic. When I am talking to someone else, for instance my neighbour, the talk goes back and forth between us. We both ask and tell about the stuff that's on our mind. And we listen so we can interact and respond to the other person.
When you're a company and you're only communicating your view, your perspective, the user isn't part of a conversation - he is only a receiver. So you have no idea if the user appreciates this or not - there's no interaction - like there is with me and my neighbour.
Corporate human
Now imagine being that company and start looking at yourself as a human too. How would you communicate with your user now? Are you spitting information at him or are you engaging with him and trying to find out how you can best service the guy? Are you offering interaction and engaging instead of just being a sender? I'd like to think so. And there we have H2H communications.
Future
H2H will only become bigger I think. Apps and websites are becoming more personal all the time. We are able to show information that is only interesting for certain audiences. Its possible to not show information that isn't interesting to you. Because of the persona's, journeys and user research websites and apps are becoming more personalized all the time. We haven't seen the end of it yet, I can imagine this to become even bigger in the future.
H2H
Do I think H2H it replaces B2B or B2C? Maybe. Obviously there are differences between B2B and B2C, but you are and always will be working with people. So in a way I think its true, H2H is the future. I think it won't take long before the first companies are claiming their place in the field stating that they are into H2H communications.
And with that I have tried to make you see why I believe in H2H in just a few short paragraphs. Obviously there's more to it - but I didn't want this post to become too long. I read somewhere that a blog post should be short and to the point. ;)
Kind regards,
Corné
A relatively recent US development ruled that corporations are 'People' http://www.npr.org/2014/07/28/335288388/when-did-companies-become-people-excavating-the-legal-evolution
BeantwoordenVerwijderenThe reasons why certain corporations pushed for that ruling are predictable: they wanted more rights, fewer restrictions.
But H2H is an interesting aside, and I think destined to sit on a shelf gathering dust until corporations are told that it is a profit centre. Which will require marketing, and therefore paid-for-motives, funded by customers, corporations.
And a quick search says they're on the case: http://www.hbagency.com/h2h-pr-havent-we-always-been-doing-it/
B2B communications is completely different to B2C though, from a messaging perspective: you and I know from working in a B2B agency back in the day that when a company talks to another company it uses different arguments to grab money: how to profit from the end-user, the C.
B2C is more direct in grabbing money, because it harnesses the emotive triggers that are easier to play with in messaging.
H2H will be absorbed by both B2C and B2B as an argument in the selling process. I really think that's all it is useful for.
I guess Facebook and Twitter et al are already shining examples of 'encouraging communication between people and facilitating the ease and spread of connection';
Facebook has already monetised it, the goal of every corporation. Twitter is still fumbling, but for me, the most amusing aspect of this H2H discussion is the same raised by the last link above: we're already doing it; we evolved language for that very purpose.
The fact that automated systems and platforms and business models are running out of tricks to grab money while we communicate, that's the only reason I can see for this H2H spectre to have risen: more grabbing, with more subtlelty.
I'd like to question if the differences are still that big. Maybe the tone of voice and words we use are still a bit different, but from my perspective as a designer they've grown closer. That was not the point of my article though.
VerwijderenThe main thing I wanted to point out is that we use more and more time to define the user in the creative process. User journey's, personas, analytics, ...We know more and more about the visitors of our website. Yet, very often we still look at the company as an it. Not as a person. And I think we should as it makes you understand more about the communications. When talking to someone, both parties participate, have opinions, defend arguments and so on. Like the example of my neighbour.
I think companies should also define themselves in the creative process. Who do you want to be? What is your tone of voice? And how does that help you cross-channel? How to deal with a complaint on Twitter for instance? Sometimes "acting" like a human makes all the difference.
Thanks for your feedback Mr B. Much appreciated. Thanks for adding the links too!