Serve Don't Sell: How Serving People Online Builds Business

Serve Don’t Sell has a simple mission: to highlight and honor educational and inspiring acts of service in digital social public. CSRA’s client work in experiential social media and research projects in ethnographic research of social media have me scouring public social networks, forums, blogs and other interactive digital social venues for examples of business helping others, and I feature these examples on Serve Don’t Sell and link back to the original sources. I don’t publish private conversations to which I have access without permission. Unless specified, sources are public and accessible via Google.

I am constantly inspired by the profound acts of service I encounter, and I want to honor some of them here because few businesspeople understand what I’m talking about when I describe these helping conversations. Having been in professional services since the 1980s, I have seen that expert knowledge, which used to be exclusive to “experts,” is now widespread within the public. People have always been smart, but they have been isolated and compromised during the analog era, relative to organizations. Digital social networks now accelerate knowledge, so pockets of people are incredibly well informed about any kind of topic you can imagine—and many that you cannot ;^). Serve Don’t Sell aims to raise the awareness of smart crowds.

Serve Don’t Sell is organized by CSRA, which helps businesses understand how social business (social media and social networks) are changing business relationships. Most businesspeople have been conditioned to think about “customers” to whom they “sell” products and services. During the 20th century, much of business became de-personalized, but social media is changing that. Businesspeople need to relearn how to focus on serving people without “selling” to them. That’s why I feel the examples on Serve Don’t Sell are so important.

I do not think that businesspeople need to become full-time good samaritans, unconcerned with business and profit. What I have found is that consistently serving people in specific situations drives more profit because people trust you more and many will want to buy from you when they see that you sincerely have their interest in mind. In many cases, they will recommend you to their friends and networks. The Trust Business Chain Reaction shows how trust monetizes.

Before you think I’m crazy, consider that multiples of people are watching the interactions in digital public. So, when you serve others, you build your reputation among many more people than you realize. And any of them might recommend you. Many will when they understand through your interactions that you have relevant expertise and you want to serve them. Most important, people find it hard to resist someone who is relevant and focused and who cares.

I hope that these stories and examples of service will inspire you to begin serving.

Lastly, I invite you to get involved and help B2B sales, marketing and management to tap the potential of service. To learn how you can support our mission, please see “Get Involved.”

Serve Don’t Sell Examples

Here are my hand-picked examples of people serving other people, in B2B and B2C contexts. The purpose here is to illustrate what it looks like. Please note that the table is built real-time; sometimes it takes a few seconds, so thanks for your patience.

B2B Conversations

Look at these inspiring examples of clients collaborating to advise each other about real estate, B2B sales, installing/maintaining smart home and security systems, and selecting vendors.

B2C Examples

As buyers of services and products, customers of all products and services are increasingly well informed because they get inside information about everything online—by finding and consulting people in similar situations about the gotchas, prices, and other “inside scoop” information before they even approach providers or stores. Most of the people that help are customers of relevant products/services, and the best responses are backed with facts. It’s increasingly common to overhear very informed customers in stores knowing more about products than store employees.

CSRA Serve Don’t Sell Posts

Some of my thinking on how the relationships between providers and users of products and services are changing profoundly. People who understand this trend and how to respond to it have a rare competitive advantage. Those who continue to put their own agendas ahead of customers’ will suffer increasingly because they are out of synch with customers’ expectations.

Even more posts on serving, not selling B2B sales, B2B marketing, human resources.

Serve Don’t Sell Discussions

Discussions about serving people online in which I’m participating:

Even more Serve Don’t Sell discussions…