This is an interesting excerpt from an article I just read. It emphasizes the importance of spreading ideas rather than imposing them on your web customer. Make your marketing message viral by being an apprentice of your customer rather than a marketer because they have the power to chose what they would like to see.

Marketers and communicators are trained to think like dog trainers. The dog is the customer and needs to be made do what the master (the organization) wants it to. That’s old school marketing and communication and it doesn’t work so well on the Web.

To succeed on the Web we need to change our mentality from seeing ourselves as a master to seeing ourselves as an apprentice. The customer is the master and we need to learn about what they need to do right now, and help them do that.

The web customer is purposeful, directed, action-oriented. They are on a journey and we need first and foremost to help them get to their destination. Then and only then have we any chance of introducing to them the idea of taking a new journey.

Here’s a link to the complete article: Web Turns Marketing and Communications on its Head.