The Tribalization of Business

A new survey sponsored by Deloitte examines how companies are sponsoring and interacting with on-line communities. The 2008 “Tribalization of Business” survey finds that corporations are now regularly sponsoring on-line communities, but that these on-line networks remain quite small. A majority of sponsored on-line communities have fewer than 500 active members. In keeping with the current focus on open or user-led innovation, companies cite “idea generation” and “product development” as the primary intended benefits of on-line communities. In practice, few on-line communities are achieving these goals. This poor performance results from the limited size of the average on-line networks and poor management of on-line community interactions.