Selling to Consumers

Convener: Phil Wolff

Notes-taker: Paul Osman

Tags:

OpenID, Identity, Data Portability, Evangelism, Marketing, Political Activism

Discussion notes:


 * Who to evangelize to? B2B or B2C?
 * Most efforts so far have been targeted towards site operators (B2B).
 * B2B evangelism is still beneficial. Rely on them to educate consumers about benefits / value / etc. (Teach the teacher).
 * How to market to consumers? Message is confusing (Too many choices!).
 * How to simplify the stack (easy to implement, easy to use).
 * What distribution / marketing channels to use?
 * We're an industry. Do we need a foundation (is it OpenID?)
 * What's been successful? Media (Fear mongering)
 * Inject the message into the user experience (i.e. remember sites directing users to update insecure browsers).
 * Successful case studies (EV Certs, Creative Commons, Privacy Policies)
 * Parallel with history of credit cards (i.e. used to be one per merchant, then VISA and MC convinced users that “membership had benefits”).
 * Progressive disclosure: Don't expose everything to the user at once. Ease them in.
 * Start with low risk but high value (i.e. start with friendfeed, not banks).
 * Messages:
 * “Safe Identity”
 * “Let My Data Go!” - Agit-prop campaign, make consumers demand it
 * “Membership Has Its Benefits!” - VISA and Mastercard approach (it's a club!)
 * Next Steps:
 * Get to the root of the problem (data portability? Identity?)
 * Solve the cognitive gap (Life Identity vs. Accounts)
 * Participants exchanged email addresses, another session proposed.