Death of the CONSUMERS

First and foremost, what are consumers? – as defined by Wikipedia, “a broad label for any individuals or households that use goods and services generated within the economy. The concept of consumer occurs in different contexts, so that the usage and significance of the term may vary.” Typically every one of us are consumers, every day we consume different products and utilize different man – made creations / products. Every day, we go shopping and buy something to eat. We consume something and that is why we are called consumers. Historically, we as consumers are passive. We tend to see products passively. The market has the capacity to demand and control the products as well as the prices of the stuff they made. And as consumers, we simply abide to them. We just let the market do as they please. Also as consumers we need to be responsible. Being a responsible consumer means being aware of your rights and the consumer protection services provided by law and various government agencies. Be a proactive consumer and actively protect your right to choose of safe, reliable quality products. When it comes to choices, as consumer, it is everyone’s basic right to choose, however, you can be equally responsible in keeping yourself informed of how really good and reasonable you are about your choices. As a responsible consumer to start with, there are millions of products that are offered worldwide but you must be selective in protecting yourself from misleading advertisement and shun consumer products that don’t serve the best interest to consumers. Only patronize consumer goods offering better concession and value. Monitor and note down products that adhere to the ethics of truth in advertising and refrain from being misled by unscrupulous vendors and advertisers. Every Consumer has the right of choice and access to products that are in compliance with quality and safety standards set by the government regulatory body. It is also of anyone’s right to approve or reject from onerous terms and restrictions in service contracts for telecoms, internet, electricity and other services.

Other globally recognized rights in store for every consumer to wit:
• To be given the facts and information to make right choices.
• To select from a range of quality and reasonably price goods and services.
• To be protected against any hazards that can affect one’s health or life.
• To be duly represented in policy or in product development to obtain proper consumer education.
• To get a fair resolution of just claims.
• To respect everyone’s right to live and work in a healthy and sustainable environment.

Along with these rights, every consumer has to be vigilant and critically aware of the social and environmental impacts of his or her choices.
As the trend in technology continues to influence us in every aspect of our lives, we consumers have evolved and break the traditional passive consumers. We have broken the seal that binds us to the traditional way of passivity. Now we are labeled as “prosumers”. A way different from passive consumers, prosumer means proactive consumers. Hence the name suggests. The death of the consumers means that there is a new breed of consumers in this era. And that new breed is called PROSUMERS.

A new survey by the Economist Intelligence Unit predicts that by 2013 customers will be the most important source of innovation within organizations. The term "prosumer" defines a situation where the line between producer and consumer blur.
In the past, customers have often been involved in product development. However, this has typically taken place near the end of the product development process. Now Web 2.0 or social media is making ongoing interactions between customers and companies feasible.
This prediction for the growth of "prosuming" will not be a surprise to many. Companies like Proctor and Gamble, Nokia and Lego are doing it today with tremendous success. Research and development costs are decreasing, customers actually want the new products and features, and prosumers become passionate advocates—before the product is launched.
In times to come, the consumer will not be content with riding pillion. They will want to actively drive and shape the market, thus the name implies. Proactive consumers are those who are a section of consumers who are no longer part of a passive market upon which industry dumps consumer goods but who are an intrinsic part of the creative process. Customer-led innovation is inevitable, most marketers and advertisers aver citing the rush of hobbyist-hackers to improve everything from Legos to computers to solutions to arrest hair fall. The term “prosumer” isn’t a new one. It’s been around the marketing world for years, but in today’s world of the social web, it has taken on a new importance that marketers can’t ignore. The term “prosumer” has transformed from “professional consumer” to “product and brand advocate”. Rather than simply “consuming” products, people are becoming the voices of those products and significantly impacting the success or failure of companies, products, and brands, particularly through their involvement on the social web. In simplest terms, no longer are businesses completely in control of their products, brands and messages. Today, consumers are in control. The leaders of this shift are the members of the social web — bloggers, microbloggers, forum posters, social networking participants, and so on, who spread messages, influence people around the world, and drive demand. Prosumers are the online influencers that marketers must not just identify but also acknowledge, respect and develop relationships with in order for their products and brands to thrive. The high level steps to leveraging the power of prosumers are as follows:

1. Identify the key online influencers for your product, brand, business or industry (i.e., the prosumers).
2. Acknowledge those people (e.g., send product samples, ask opinions, etc.).
3. Join the online conversation where those people already spend time.
4. Develop relationships with those people by interacting with them, providing useful information, and being accessible and human.
5. Leverage the opportunities of the social web by creating your own branded destinations such as a blog, YouTube channel, Twitter profile, Facebook group or fan page, LinkedIn group, podcast, etc.

The bottom line to connecting with prosumers and to get them talking about and advocating your brand, products and business is to deliver content that adds value to their experience with your brand. Then, don’t be afraid to let them take control and spread your messages. That’s where the power of the social web and online influencers to drive word-of-mouth marketing farther than ever comes into the picture, and that’s the ultimate goal for marketers.

Product champions
On an average a proactive consumer or for brevity prosumer will speak to nine people, compared to a consumer who will speak to two people about the same thing. They are human media, a powerful word-of-mouth brigade. They are brand evangelists, so to say. The prosumer as defined above is a proactive consumer who is an enthusiastic outlet of sorts, who goes out of his way to promote the brand he likes. He becomes the product champion, an evangelist of sorts.

Trend spotters
Prosumers are of particular value to marketers looking to anticipate future trends. They are an early warning system about consumer next and a true conversational currency. For the marketing giant, they are an important enough category to be studied. And for marketers, they both reflect and shape markets. Being highly communicative, they pickup what others are thinking and reflect it through the lens of their own experiences. And, being interested in innovation, they gather information widely. They could be jostling in the malls, arcades and stores, foraging for bargains, discounts and promotional offers. Today’s consumers cannot just be propositioned; they need in a brand a promise of sustained tenure of togetherness. He goes on to add that a brand must be good to cohabit with; it must create that space where brand prosumers can keep each other company.

Value plus
The change in stance is reflected clearly in cosmetics. There has been a distinct evolution in the offering, from where the product is simple (nail enamel, lipstick, skin cream, hair color) to the brand morphing into an institution. Pond’s as a brand is not just a solution that we can apply. Instead, it is a complete program in itself— the Pond’s Institute. Thus Pond’s is not just a skin cream or moisturizer for a basic need; it is a brand integrating product and service solution. The idea to continue with the consumer offering and take it to the next level is that of the prosumer. The evolution of the digital camera best illustrates the point. For ages, photography was considered an art form to be practiced only by the eccentric few who had loads of money to develop tons of film rolls too get those few treasured shots. Not any more. Since its inception, digital photography has gained immense popularity. Major factors influencing trend were the case of handling and low running costs and these advantages were publicized by prosumers. The idea was simple: break free from the clasp and clutter of manual cameras and embrace its more popular cousin, the digital camera.

Emotional connect
Advertising mavericks are now turning to emotions as a plank to cut across the clutter. A brand’s equity that is built over intangible parameters also takes a longer time and effort for a competitor to be able to neutralize. The birth of many a great brand owes much to this idea. Like Marlboro Country, where the flavor is the outdoors, the ruggedness, the self-sufficiency and the solitude. The caring Nivea male, the Johnson& Johnson mom, the Six Sigma of Motorola, the Nike jogger are more such examples. Prosumers resent heavy-handed attempts to beat them into submission, preferring instead high-quality, entertaining advertising work. Good advertising flatters their well-developed sense of discernment. Prosumers are the approximately 20-30% of people t the vanguard of consumerism. It is difficult to fool them. We have moved on to the next level in the consumer need ladder. With increasing product parity and technological equality, consumers are looking beyond a straightforward solution. Communication for more and more services utilizes functional benefits more as a support rather than as a driver.
As the social web has grown and tools like Twitter, blogs, Facebook and YouTube have allowed communications to flow faster and further than ever before — inevitably causing the world to shrink and real-time to be the expectation — people have changed. Those changes affect most aspects of our daily lives, including our roles as individuals with buying power, and that’s a shift that businesses and their employees need to understand if they want to stay profitable in the future. In simplest terms, people have moved from being CONsumers to PROsumers with far more influence than ever before.The term “prosumer” isn’t a new one. It’s been around the marketing world for years, but in today’s world of the social web, it has taken on a new importance that business leaders and marketers can’t ignore. The term “prosumer” has transformed from meaning “professional consumer” to meaning “product and brand advocate.” Rather than simply “consuming” products, people are becoming the voices of those products and significantly impacting the success or failure of companies, products, and brands, particularly through their involvement on the social web. No longer are businesses completely in control of their products, brands and messages. Today, consumers are in control. The leaders of this shift are the members of the social web — bloggers, microbloggers, forum posters, social networking participants, and so on, which spread messages, influence people around the world, and drive demand. Prosumers are the online influencers that business leaders and marketers must not just identify but also acknowledge, respect and develop relationships with in order for their products and brands to thrive.

The high level steps to leveraging the power of prosumers are as follows:
• Identify the key online influencers for your product, brand, business or industry (i.e., the prosumers).
• Acknowledge those people (e.g., send product samples, ask opinions, etc.).
• Join the online conversation where those people already spend time.
• Develop relationships with those people by interacting with them, providing useful information, and being accessible and human.
• Leverage the opportunities of the social web by creating your own branded destinations such as a blog, YouTube channel, Twitter profile, Facebook group or fan page, LinkedIn group, podcast, etc.

The bottom line to connect with prosumers and to get them talking about and advocating you, your brand, products and business is to deliver content that adds value to their experiences with your brand online. Then, don’t be afraid to let them take control and spread your messages. That’s where the power of the social web and online influencers to drive word-of-mouth marketing farther than ever comes into the picture, and that’s the ultimate goal for business leaders and marketers.

There is a vision, a bright shiny vision of a new future in which museums and their users become conspirators in the process of capturing, preserving and interpreting culture. These new museums will be open, democratic, agile and able to reflect the shifting patterns of life in contemporary society. This vision is informed in part by the vocabulary of the Digital Revolution - a post-Web 2.0 vocabulary of ‘prosumers’ and ’perpetual beta’ which denotes a basic attitudinal shift in the process of producing and delivering services. These new models, even where they don’t involve technology, are intrinsically connected to a technological world-view. A picture in which there are no barriers to entry, a Digital meritocracy where both tools and content are open to all to use, where you can go from idea to business to millionaire in the space of a week. Ever since the 1950’s, technology has earned its keep by promising more than it is capable of, and the new era is no different. Although the code may be open-source, the community of people who are able to do anything with it represents just as much of an oligarchic closed shop as the Athenian aristocracy. This glamour - the illusory and fleeting appeal of vogueish technologies which makes it impossible to discern real, lasting social movements from tiny whorls of Digital possibility - is dangerous for any sector which embraces it too readily, and particularly so for one as delicately positioned in society as Cultural Heritage.
Resources:
http://openculture.collectionstrustblogs.org.uk/2009/05/21/prosumers-seriously/