Who you are speaks so loudly I can’t hear what you’re saying

A powerful global conversation has begun. Through the Internet, people are discovering and inventing new ways to share relevant knowledge with blinding speed. As a direct result, markets are getting smarter — and they are getting smarter faster than most companies.”

This is the fundamental but prophetic message of The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business As Usual, which was first written in 1999 and published in 2001 by Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searles, and David Weinberger.

Ten years after, the agitators of the weighty work came out with The Cluetrain Manifesto 10th Anniversary Edition. Aside from the full text of the original manuscript, the new issue has a fresh introduction, supplementary chapters by the authors complete with reflections on the relevance of the ideas today, and updates describing what have and have not come to pass as predicted in the original text.

To get a helpful, fast experience and understanding of what the book is about, take a few minutes to read the 95 interconnected theses in its opening pages or on the homepage of cluetrain.com. Go through the list twice or thrice and be surprised that the concepts were on paper 14 years ago but still resonate today. The theses called for businesses to join the conversation in the marketplace as real people, or they would go elsewhere and gladly engage in doing business with other companies that were willing to have real, human relationships with them.

Not everything envisaged in the theses list has come true —well, not yet, anyway — but the paperback remains remarkably relevant and continues to be predictive. Prediction isn’t always about foreseeing the future. It is as much about publicly stating a message to those in the here and now concerning a situation and addressing the consequences of acting or not acting properly in response. In that sense, it persists in being prophetic.

If you are involved in marketing and corporate communication, this seminal work is a must-read. As a reviewer enthused, “There are far too many companies in 2013 who still haven’t learned the lessons these authors were shouting from the rooftops in 1999.” And whether you buy or don’t buy into the basic theses of The Cluetrain Manifesto as distilled below, this provocative project is an essential feed for a crucial conversation many businesses still need to engage in.

Markets are conversations. Markets consist of people, not demographic sectors. Conversations among human beings sound human, and they are conducted in a human voice. Whether delivering information, opinions, perspectives, dissenting arguments or humorous asides, the human voice is typically open, natural, uncontrived. People recognize each other as such from the sound of this voice.

Hyperlinks undermine hierarchy. The Internet is facilitating conversations among people that were simply not possible in the era of mass media.  Connected external and internal markets are speaking to each other in a powerful way. These networked conversations are permitting influential new configurations of social organization and knowledge exchange to materialize. As a result, markets are getting smarter, more informed, more organized. Participation in a networked market changes people fundamentally. They have figured out that they get far better information and support from one another than from vendors.

Enough of corporate speak about adding value to products that are traded. There are no secrets. The connected market knows more than companies do about their own products. And whether the news is good or bad, they spread the news. Corporations do not speak in the same voice as these connected conversations, and to their targeted online listeners and viewers, companies sound empty, unexciting and callous.

Mission statements sound artificial. Companies using a homogenized “voice,” which assume online markets are the same markets that used to watch their ads on television, are not in touch with reality. People want access to corporate information, to plans and strategies, to best thinking, and to genuine knowledge. They will not settle for the four-color brochure, for websites chock-a-block with eye candy but lacking any substance. If companies don’t realize that their markets are now networked person-to-person, are getting more and more clever, and are deeply joined in conversations, they are missing their best break.

Companies can now communicate with their markets directly. And if they blow the communication process, it could be their last opportunity. Companies need to realize their markets are often laughing at them, and at some point making fun of them. They need to loosen up and take themselves less seriously. Getting a sense of humor is good advice. It doesn’t mean putting some jokes on the corporate website. Rather, it entails sharing big values, showing a little humility, engaging in consistent straight talks, and putting forward a genuine point of view.

Companies attempting to “position” themselves need to “take” a position. Advantageously, they should hook up to something their market actually cares about. It’s pretentious horn-tooting if a company claims, “We are positioned to become the preeminent provider of x, y and z.” Essentially, the statement does not constitute a position. Companies need to come down from their ivory towers and talk to people — in their language and formats — with whom they hope to create relationships. Smart markets will find business partners who speak their own language. To speak with a human voice, companies must share the concerns of their communities. But first off, they must belong to a community.

Public relations does not relate to the public. Companies are deeply afraid of their markets. If they speak in a language that is distant, uninviting, and arrogant, they build walls to keep markets at bay. PR professionals must satisfy the frantic need of the companies they represent to “bring back the public in public relations,” to innovate, continue thriving, and stay relevant and spirited. Consumer movements involved in discovering information, consuming and sharing them have altered the hubs of power and authority from traditional PR media to online communicators, bloggers, website owners and social media-savvy publishers.

Brand loyalty is the corporate version of going steady. But the breakup is inevitable — and it is coming fast. Since they are connected, smart markets are able to renegotiate relationships with blinding speed. They can change suppliers overnight and can change employers over lunch. “The “downsizing initiatives” of companies taught people to ask the question: “Loyalty? What’s that?”

Companies make a religion of security. But this is largely a trick. Most are protecting less against competitors than against their own market and workforce. As with networked markets, employees are also talking to each other directly inside the company — and not just about rules and regulations, boardroom directives, bottom lines, new business wins and industry awards. Such conversations are taking place today on corporate intranets. Companies typically install intranets top-down to distribute HR policies and other corporate information that workers are doing their best to ignore. Intranets naturally tend to route around boredom. The best are built bottom-up by individuals who work together to build something far more valuable — a more emotional and empathetic corporate conversation. A truly engaging intranet organizes employees in many meanings of the word. Its effect is more radical than the agenda of any workers union.

Paranoia kills conversation. And lack of open conversation kills companies. There are two conversations going on in a company. One is with the workforce and the other with the market. In most cases, neither conversation is going very well. Almost invariably, the failure can be traced to outdated notions of command and control. As a policy, these notions are poisonous. As tools, they are broken. “Intranet-worked” knowledge employees meet, command and control with hostility and “internet-worked” markets have generated basic distrust in companies. These two groups want to talk to each other. They are speaking the same language. They recognize each other’s voices.

Networked individuals are immune to advertising. If companies want to talk to them, tell them something. Make it something interesting for a change. They’ve got some ideas for companies, too — some new tools they need, some better service they will enjoy, and stuff they’d be willing to pay for. Never be too busy to “do business” or to answer their email. They want attention.

“The Cluetrain Manifesto is a persuasive reminder that corporate communication can no longer be sterilized, ingeniously crafted bromides announcing the company’s brilliance of perfection,” the authors declare. People can no longer be fooled. The scripted line “Your call is very important to us” followed by “Please leave a message” just shows how little the company truly cares about them. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “Who you are speaks so loudly I can’t hear what you‘re saying.”

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Email bongosorio@yahoo.com or bong_osorio@abs-cbn.com for comments, questions or suggestions. Thank you for communicating.