Fixing Marketing + Service with VRM – intent casting & personal API’s

VRM – Fixing Marketing and Service with Intent-Casting and Personal APIs

Thursday 3A Convener: Doc Searls, Scott Shelton

Notes-taker(s): Scott Shelton

Tags for the session - technology discussed/ideas considered:

VRM, CRM, Marketing, Intention Economy, Intent-casting, Personal APIs

Discussion notes, key understandings, outstanding questions, observations, and, if appropriate to this discussion: action items, next steps:

Demonstrated a POC of how a sample VRM conversation might flow between marketers, consumers, and businesses. Can we give marketers a new channel for communicating and engaging with customers that solves problems they can’t solve now and yet respects the customer’s privacy, security, and data?

How is a crowdsourced Intention Engine different from Google?

• It can solve problems that Google can’t, such as connecting supply and demand for service or product needs.
• There is “money left on the table” (MLOTT) whenever a person can’t get what they want or has a problem. Whether a first, second, or third party can fulfill that need, we are missing a channel for everyone to recognize the missed opportunities and a vehicle for solving them.
• Google, Siri, Cortana, Alexa, and others can automate a lot of answers by parsing natural language, but they cannot typically answer questions about supply and demand or give them an easy channel for communicating and interacting.

Understanding intent properly is dependent in part from discerning what words you know and what they mean to you in a given context. This is critical for understanding intent and authorization. While Google, Apple, et al know a LOT about us, the only person who can truly express your intent best is YOU. Perhaps another difference is that the Search box goes on a website’s Home page, whereas an Intention box might go on their “Contact Us” page. You are expressing an intent to engage. Discussed which type of ontology or storage system might “win” if this takes off and becomes popular. Suggestions include JSON Linked Data (JSONLD), Microsoft Azure, Blockstack. Also, who controls my personal data store—someone like Personal.com? Perhaps we don’t need a winner if we can develop an “identity interface” or sockets that people can talk to and let the intention engine just be a broker for communication.