Over the last couple of months the ENOVIA communities team has been engaged with Francois Gossieaux, the founder of Human 1.0 to explore what drives people to join online communities. In particular, with the expansion of 3DSwYm, we’ve been working to better understand how the SOCIAL rather than the MEDIA element of the social media phenomenon drives users to engage and participate online – all with the aim of faciltating social innovation.

The biggest “ah-ha” moment for us so far has been that, based on thousands of years of evolution, humans are hardwired to want to participate in specific communities or tribes – often driven by a variety of factors including a need for recognition/validation or a desire to belong.  The question becomes, how do companies leverage this to successfully engage with their key tribes as they develop their online strategies?

In conjunction with his partner Ed Moran, director of Insights and Innovation at Deloitte, Francois has been exploring this issue in  great detail over the last few years and many of their findings are based on an annual survey entitled “The Tribalization of Business Study”.  This study examines how some of the world’s most innovative and largest companies are using social innovation to connect with their users and drive business. If you’d like to read more on this topic Francois and Ed have also recently published a book titled the Hyper Social Organization.

I’ll be writing more about this in the coming months, but I thought that this summary video from Francois and Ed provided a really nice snap shot of some of the factors and behaviors that drive people to join tribes. This video also provides a little insight into how companies need to change their ways of doing business to effectively engage with these tribes.

Take a look at the video – I’d be interested in your feedback.

Does this resonate with you? How are you connecting with your users to build social innovation online?

Best,

David