Virtual Customer Environments: IT-Enabled Customer Co-innovation and Value Co-creation - Information Technology and Product Development - page 118

with the characteristics of the product/service. As such, care should be taken in
conducting such studies to clearly identify and control for the important product (or
service) characteristics.
6.6 Organizational Strategies to Enhance Customer
Participation in VCEs
The most important implication of research on VCEs relates to the strategies and
practices that companies can adopt to enhance value-adding customer participation
in VCEs. Studies on the issues outlined in this chapter so far, from the nature of cus-
tomer role to customer motivations to customer experience, could provide valuable
directions for companies in identifying a portfolio of VCE strategies. Broadly, these
managerial implications fall into three categories: design elements of VCEs; integra-
tion of VCEs with other parts of the innovation system; and customer relationship
management.
6.6.1 Designing VCEs to Promote Customer Participation
Evidently, companies can create richer innovating environments by incorporating
key design features into their VCEs. For example, having enough product-related
content in the VCE is important not only to advance customer innovation capabil-
ities but also to enhance learning. Companies such as Microsoft are experimenting
with product content rating systems - for example, peer ratings and other social
metrics that help customers gauge the depth and accuracy of product-related knowl-
edge in the interactions. Similarly, new semantic visualization tools have been
created that allow customers to identify patterns in customer conversations and nav-
igate toward the content-rich part of those conversations (Donath, 2002; Erickson,
Halveson, Kellogg, &Wolf, 2002; Smith, 2002). Companies can also create product
knowledge centers that can feed customers the right knowledge at the right time.
Such centers can also offer virtual product simulation tools that allow customers to
acquire deeper product knowledge.
Companies including IBM, HP, and Microsoft have instituted programs that con-
fer titles and awards to customers taking part in VCEs. For example, every year
Microsoft selects “Most Valuable Professionals,” or MVPs from customers who
contribute to the product support activities through its VCE. Customers value these
titles because they come from a customer community they identify with. Similarly,
design features that provide customers with better social cues - that is, add to the
social translucence - offer richer social experiences and permit richer customer dis-
cussions. Companies can also create gated customer forums within their VCE that
give members a sense of exclusiveness and add to the sociability experience. Such
exclusive forums not only permit companies to have deeper customer engagement
with but also provide customers a stronger sense of social identity, which in turn
leads to more positive experiences.