They say knowledge is power. And for a businessman looking for a way to grow his business, any amount of knowledge that would make him ahead of the competition is valuable. Hence, in the age of technology and vast amounts of data, a system that could turn senseless albeit huge amounts of data into sensible and coherent knowledge is worthwhile. These information systems are referred to as knowledge management systems a.k.a. KMS.
The easiest and most accessible knowledge in any organization is their explicit knowledge which as defined in class is the knowledge that is stored, codified and documented. However, there is another type of knowledge that is just as important but not as easily accessible or interpreted. That is tacit knowledge which refers to personal knowledge as embedded in individual factors involving various intangible forces. To me, this type of knowledge is more powerful than the former since the bearer of this type of knowledge can easily take it with him to the detriment of the company if it hasn’t been documented or sorted yet. Hence, it is up to the company to ensure that the knowledge their employees have are constantly documented and stored in safe places.
In Marketing, we are concerned with both types of knowledge. Monthly, we deal with explicit knowledge. I would like to think of these as the recorded customer responses to our products and promotions as interpreted from sales figures, product movements, response rates, etc. Yet, we also deal with tacit knowledge, which is usually, to us more important. We want to always be in the know of the customers actual response to our products and promos. We want to know how they actually feel about what we just did or if they actually understood what we tried to communicate. And yet, this tacit knowledge that is important to us, is by far the hardest to get. Of course, we have the basic customer surveys, yet there are times when these surveys can be influenced and are not really direct representations of how our customers feel about our business.
Thankfully, we have now moved on to the social network age where people are more open to share about their feelings and perceptions via social media. This has been largely beneficial to brands because now they can already be privy to how customers actually perceive their products via what they post or discuss in social media.
Yet with this wealth comes a large challenge, how does one actually sift through all the data and separate the noise and useless clatter from the ones that can actually be useful?
To date, there has sprung a lot of online applications that allows brands to filter through the millions and millions of social network data to filter the chatter that is relevant to them. Some applications have even gone as far off as to identify the mood of the customers when they discuss the particular product or brand.
To say the least, these type of applications, which are information systems themselves, are a brand’s best friend and savior. In a time when a company is unsure of how the market actually perceives them, then they can easily turn to the wealth of knowledge in social media, filter through the huge amount of clutter, and determine the most useful and relevant information that could be their saving grace.
Related articles
- A knowledge management approach to marketing and the advent of customer knowledge management (slideshare.net)
- Week 7: Knowledge Management Reflection (mgtforinforprofessionals.wordpress.com)
