Aug 23

The trouble with collaborative consumption is…

 

Our intrepid Marketing Manager, Bek, was invited to speak at the August gathering of Social Media Women down at the amazing Chapel Bar at Bar 100 by the Rocks. You can read the first half of her run down on eXpertLocal at Social Media Women here.

In the second half of the discussion at Social Media Women, Bek tackled collaborative consumption and social media, as well as the current barriers to consumer adoption of collaborative consumption ideas.

Why are collaborative consumption and social media suited?

Both collaborative consumption and social media share that common underpinning of requiring community conversation to make them work. When someone produces content on the internet, whether it’s a blog, a fan page on Facebook or even tweets a joke, it needs to move beyond simply being content for contents sake and garner the interest, approval and interaction of other people. For it really to be social media, it needs to move from broadcast to inviting social interaction.

The same is true of collaborative consumption. You need to bring a minimum of two people together on a platform in order for it to work. One person has the idea; the other person needs to participate. You can’t have one without the other; otherwise it’s simply an idea with no execution.

That is part of the biggest challenge in either case because getting one person to act is hard enough, let alone two. Both social media and collaborative consumption will have an investment of time, labour and ideas that is met with silence. It’s working out how to turn that silence to conversation and then into action that is the key.

Social media and collaborative consumption face the same challenges

Social media without likes, shares, comments, follows, fans and so on isn’t really social media. However as anyone who’s ever started a blog or had an idea for a page would know you will spend a lot of time in the first instance putting content out onto the internet with little or no interaction. Or you’ll put a heap of stuff out there and find people respond to it weeks and months later.

Collaborative consumption is a beautiful theory. The idea that we’ll all come together to share an amazing time over a meal, through a drill, via a walk around the beach or through grabbing a lift with someone else is exquisite. It taps into that feeling that we love being a part of a community. Collaborative consumption relies on the idea that we are these wonderful caring, sharing creatures who want to help people, the planet and our community to connect and create a shared bond- if only someone was there to give us a little push in the right direction.

But the issue is more complex than that. We’re hard wired to think that because we align our values with something, because we share a piece of information or say we’re a part of something that it’s actually true. But the truth is just like pinning a photo of a handbag to your Pinterest board that you never intend to buy is nothing more than wishful thinking, saying you are keen on sharing with other people and then not taking the opportunity to move that statement into action means the theory of collaborative consumption remains, but the required usage simply isn’t there.

Humans are irrational, full of fear, a little bit crazy, egocentric, loving, loopy, and lazy and a whole lot of other things that don’t always lend themselves well to theoretical concepts.

Thankfully, if enough people help us get used to a concept or approve of our interaction with an idea, we will adopt it into our way of life if we truly do believe in it. However, this is a process that takes time, education, gentle prodding and a lot of coaxing.

Changing our attitudes is the only way either thing works

Talking about yourself on your blog, Twitter, Facebook or whatever chosen social media channel you use is not “social” media, its media creation. There’s a fine line between telling everyone everything all the time and educating people to your thoughts- and that line is firmly drawn at the difference between one sided broadcasting and being able to create connection. You want social media, you have to make room for participation.

With collaborative consumption, if you want people to collaborate and share, they need to feel in charge. Participants need to feel as though you have their back. And they need to be given the information they can use to meet other people’s objections, justify their own time and energy, and feel like they are doing something for themselves as part of that process. And that sense of doing it for themselves has to come from more than “aren’t you lovely being a part of this wonderful movement and helping the environment and community”.

Liking something doesn’t mean it works

We already know through studies about the green food and products movement that people support it in the language they use more than they do or are able with their wallet. Same with buying local or supporting Australian made things.

Things that appeal to us on a social responsibility level that we wear as badges of honour may not get the physical action they need to be practical or even sustainable. Like 6 out of 10 people saying they like the ABC, but TV ratings consistently demonstrating its more like 4 out of 10 that will tune in. Or people sharing something on social media because they believe in a cause and yet not taking the next step to sign their name to a petition to make the change or financially support the bodies that are on the ground doing the work.

In that respect, the love of the idea of collaborative consumption far outstrips usage of it on a practical level.

It’s all about perspective

People, Australians, are very cynical. They are worried about breakages and thefts in item, house or car sharing, axe murderers running tours or providing lifts. Being ripped off, bamboozled or put in a bad situation are the common objections people put up when you suggest the idea of collaborative consumption.

The ‘fear of the bad man’ is the same problem eBay or Gumtree faced. Actually, it’s the same problem any business should face because you don’t know if the bus driver will end up being an axe murder or the dude who makes your lunchtime sandwich is on the level. You don’t know if that tenant you get for your rental will pay on time or look after your place. You don’t know if that tour guide you’re following on holidays really knows what they are doing or is ripping you off.

Yet we trust anyway. We’ve been conditioned to trust a place because they have a uniform, a shop and a sign on the door. These are the things collaborative consumption lacks.

This lack of formalised business is consumer freedom

If anything, collaborative consumption removes the layers we don’t need. By dealing with a person and renting that drill or hiring that tour directly, you aren’t dealing with a company and therefore aren’t paying their rent, for their marketing team or their overheads. You aren’t getting the watered down committee version of an experience designed by 7 people instead of the one person who really does know what they are on about. And you aren’t paying a margin to shareholders, a balance sheet or for a projected annual profit. There aren’t several layers of businesses all trying to get their margin viewing the exercise from a perspective of pure profitability.

We’ve been conditioned to think dealing with a company that usually doesn’t give a damn about us is safer than dealing with one person who is genuinely interested in sharing, helping and being connected to another human being. These same companies that encourage us to buy things we don’t need, spend money through credit we don’t have and isolate ourselves from each other in competitions to outdo the neighbours, the guy at work or whoever we think we’re in competition with.

The trouble with collaborative consumption is…

The concept is really new and we aren’t sure how to deal with it properly. It asks us on some level to change the way we think about ownership, how we’re meant to relate to other human beings and give up a lot of things that have kept us quite comfortable for a while.

It asks us to trust people. To move away from governments and corporations as big bodies in the sky who must be accountable for everything they do (and generally aren’t), who represent our best interests (and generally don’t), and stop viewing other people as a potential threat, or an idiot, or a scammer or whatever.

Collaborative consumption doesn’t want to rank you by the things you own or the expensive things you do. And for a lot of us, this is a completely alien concept.

For collaborative consumption (or the sharing economy as it is otherwise known) to work, we need to have a little more faith in our fellow human beings. We need to move away from shooting down an idea after 5 minutes and try it out, see if it works for ourselves.

And sometimes I wonder if we’re brave enough to do that.

I certainly hope so.