Starbucks To Customers: We Want YOUR Ideas

In the midst of a falling stock price and renewed efforts from CEO Howard Schultz to prop up the world's largest premium coffee company, Starbucks has taken a page out of Dell's social media playbook and launched the MyStarbucksIdea website.


MarektingProf: Starbucks Launches Its Version of Dell's Ideastorm

As they pulled out of the "Dell Hell" maelstrom, Dell launched "IdeaStorm" as a means to collect feedback from the community at large and funnel these ideas, critiques, and suggestions into their product development mix. It's been a hugely popular asset for Dell, and Starbucks is now going after something similar for themselves.

MyStarbucksIdea

Registered Starbucks users can log in and submit their ideas, vote on the ideas of others, and see progress updates on those ideas that have been officially chosen. They're also staffing this with self-proclaimed "Idea Partners", or subject matter experts across various aspects of the company.

So far, they're (a) listening to customers, and (b) staffing around the initiative to ensure they're being responsive to these ideas.

Looks like someone in Legal definitely spent some time working through the language around the site; in response to the FAQ question which ideas will actually get picked:

"Everyone helps decide by voting. Ideas posted to the "Popular Ideas" section of the website (determined by using an algorithm based on number of points, number of comments and recency of post) will be considered, but our Idea Partners may also choose ideas simply because they think they’re promising."

Notice everyone "helps decide" and that Popular Ideas "will be considered, but [Starbucks] may also choose ideas simply because they think they're promising."

So in one sense it's a legal out to say that Starbucks is not solidly committing to the most popular idea that the community votes on, but perhaps this is a calculated measure to ensure that the idea is in line with their brand marketing strategy. But then again, isn't the point of all of this about altering the course of your brand strategy to meet the needs of your community?

What does this mean for other businesses?

I'm pretty optimistic about how this will develop for Starbucks, and I can't overstate their point about "Idea Partners." These offerings can have some pretty dramatic implications for businesses (positive and negative), but you need someone at the helm to steer the ship.

It's safe to assume they're be some storms ahead and some uncharted waters (going back to the "storm" analogy from Dell's IdeaStorm), but it's not just about monitoring for negative comments and being proactive in responding the to criticisms out there. It's also about genuinely listening and then finding ways to react and respond to build your relationship with your community, and to grow your business in the meantime.