it's not about you or your product

jeff jarvis of BuzzMachine said in the guardian...

Where the Europeans lead the Americans must follow: "Content alone can no longer win. You must build and interact with audiences ... We now concentrate on using social software to build closer relations with the communities of readers around our magazines.' Relationships. That is what Burda builds now. That is what Murdoch just bought for $580m (�335m) when he acquired online community MySpace.com."

the whole post is interesting, but i've highlighted the content element because business often concentrates on content and forgets the relationship part.

we think because we build a better mousetrap the world will beat a path to our door, that the world is as fascinated and in awe of our own product as we are. things couldn't be further from the truth!

but if the world can talk about it, have conversations with users, find out about it through trusted social networks, they'll look for our product and maybe even buy it!

the stuff about the death of print [newspapers at least] is a prediction that we should heed in the graphics business. i've seen the level of our print work has decreased 80% in the last ten years.