Knowledge Marketing

A knowledge market is a mechanism for distributing knowledge resources. There are two views on knowledge and how knowledge markets can function. One view uses a legal construct of intellectual property to make knowledge a typical scarce resource, so the traditional commodity market mechanism can be applied directly to distribute it. An alternative model is based on treating knowledge as a public good and hence encouraging free sharing of knowledge. This is often referred to as attention economy. Currently there is no consensus among researchers on relative merits of these two approaches.

A knowledge economy include the concept of exchanging knowledge-based products and services. However, as discussed by Stewart (1996)[1], knowledge is very different from physical products. For example, it can be in more than one place at one time, selling it does not diminish the supply, buyers only purchase it once, and once sold, it cannot be recalled. Further, knowledge begets more knowledge in a never-ending cycle. Understanding of knowledge markets is beginning to emerge. As would be expected, they are very different in form from traditional markets.

Knowledge marketing : The Role of Interactive Narratives

We are repeatedly reminded that the goal of Knowledge management is to capture, classify and make available organizational knowledge. But even if we achieve this difficult task, to what extent will we have succeeded in enhancing the knowledge quotient of an organization? Just as the availability of a lime soda drink does not assure that people will drink it in droves, the availability of knowledge assets does not assure that people will actually utilize such assets.
Any marketing maven worth her stripes will be happy to confirm that the old saw – You can bring a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink – is actual only half a saw. The other half is – To even have a chance to get the horse to drink, you need to bring the horse to the water. Our marketing maven could then reel off her favourite bag of tricks calculated to make this happen – reach out to your target audience, entice your audience, speak to your audience’s desires and fears, make it easy for your audience to adopt your offering, and give your audience a taste of what’s to come. Could these tactics have a role to play in the august world of Knowledge Management?
As we think about Knowledge Management, we would do well to devote some thought to ‘Knowledge Marketing’ as well. And when we do, we will realize that our marketing maven’s trusty tactics come very handy! If we can create small, attractive nuggets of knowledge, that can easily be pushed out and absorbed, that evoke curiosity and inspire our audience to learn more, then we will be on our way to being effective knowledge marketers. While doing so, we can remind ourselves that Newton was inspired by an apple falling on his head, not an apple tree!
This is where interactive narratives come in. As in the case of many new and marginal events, there is no general recognition of the genre, let alone an agreed definition. Typically, an interactive narrative is an online experience in which a small, contained story is unfolded. Typically, the story is carried forward by a set of photographs or, on occasion, a set of diagrams or short video clips. Each visual element is accompanied by an audio voice-over or a small amount of text. The experience involves a small amount of interactivity, often nor more than choices for the learner to click from episode to episode. Typically, the entire experience takes no more than 5 minutes.
Newspapers and magazines are leading the charge in packaging small nuggets of content into interactive narratives. The New York Times and Washington Post websites regularly put forward great little interactive narratives. Ones from The New York Times that I have particularly liked over the past few months include a vignette on life of the columnist William Safire, an analysis of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s landslide electoral victory in California and a description of a journey through the Arctic national wildlife refuge. www.interactivenarratives.org is a great site which pulls together neat interactive narratives from all around the world.
Mahboob Mahmood June 2004