Communities Exchange :: Interview with Paul

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IT'S NOT ABOUT THE TOOLS: HOW ORACLE BUILDS CUSTOMER COMMUNITIES
An Interview with Paul Pedrazzi, Vice President,
Product Strategy,
Oracle

Q. Tell us a bit about Oracle's customer community, and the role you've played in building and managing it.

A. Oracle has a very large base of interested parties, from customers to partners, media, analysts and many others. We have a host of web sites and communities to address the diverse needs we see out there. Oracle.com, Oracle Technology Network (OTN), Oracle Partner Network (OPN), and most recently our social network, Mix. Mix was the site my team designed and built. We also manage its day to day operations.

Q. Let's talk about trends in social media. Can you give us a quick overview of which ones matter and why?

A. Sure. I tend to think about the broader tends around Web 2.0, of which, this new social model seems to be moving to the forefront. The biggest mistake people make is being technology centric. You can't start by thinking about wikis and blogs or you'll miss what is really profound. In addition, I also see many people inside large organizations dismissing the entire trend of "2.0" as something for kids or consumers. The key is to recognize that the world has changed to be decidedly more participatory. This impacts us in everything we do both in life and business. The organizations that understand this and move quickly to leverage it, will find it inspiring to both their customers and employees.

Q. What have you learned in using social media tools to build communities in ways that are pleasing and exciting to people?

A. We have a whole set of lessons learned that we have gleaned after building a few of these communities. I won't go into all of them, but in brief, I would ensure that your site is a joy to use. This means you focus on the User Interface a lot. Make it look as good as the consumer sites you'll be compared to. I would also seek out ways to encourage exploration. The web has an element of play in it. Navigating your community should feel more like a game than a search for content. Incidentally, I believe that game mechanics applied to business is perhaps the biggest trend that will come to life in the next several years.

Q. What have you learned about building great, people-pleasing communities that still manage to meet business goals?

A. Start with the business goals. Too many times people want a "wiki" or a "blog" because they heard it somewhere. Often those tools are not even appropriate. Begin by clearly articulating the pain you are solving. If you start there and periodically return to check yourself against the original goal, you'll be fine - but be warned, it's easy to lose yourself in cool features that add nothing to the solution.

Q. Tell us a bit about Mix.Oracle.Com. How was it formed, what were its objectives, how has it done in meeting them?

A. Our original objective was to do two things: (1) Improve the process of gaining product feedback from customers and (2) Bring together our user group community. Everything we did in the first 6 months of operation was exclusively to support those objectives. Now the hard work of bringing in the user base has begun. Planting is easy, gardening is hard.

Q. How does Oracle engage with external, independently formed communities such as HEUG (Higher Education User Group - a self formed community of educational institutions using Oracle software).

A. We have entire teams at Oracle whose mission in life is working closely with our user groups and they do it very well. These groups have their own websites, meetings, contacts and Oracle and more. Mix is just another tool in their bag of tricks. If user groups find it of value, as many have, they can jump on board. If they want to use something else, that is 100% their decision.

Q. You'll be talking about "lessons learned" at the Fall conference. Can you share a couple of your more memorable ones with us now?

A. Definitely. I'll share my favorite - "Know who to ignore and who you can't". Anyone involved in an "Enterprise 2.0" project inside a company will undoubtedly face challenges from a variety of fronts. Often times it is tough to tell what you have to do and what you should do. Knowing the difference is critical to keeping your project on track. I find that there are three groups you absolutely must pay close attention to: Legal, HR, and Security. These teams have very real concerns and I find that too many people want to hide when they drive "2.0" - It is simply unwise. When we launched Mix we worked closely with all three organizations. They were very helpful and excited to be involved.

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