Motivation Case Study - Organizational Behaviour of Thisnext.Com

Overview

Introduction

ThisNext.com is a social shopping website, Founded in 2006, by Gordon Gould and Craig Ogg. The company is driven by its volunteer workers, allowing them to create shopcasts, which serves as a personalized product playlist, helping shoppers in making their purchase decisions. Recommendations by these volunteer workers had helped to build their digital identity. The website also helps the virtual shoppers in exploring new product offerings, which were otherwise hard-to-find. The company has benefitted from volunteer workers, who receive praise and recognition in terms of their efforts. It combines benefits of social networking and online shopping, as customers rely heavily on word-of- mouth recommendations supported by a survey showing that more than 30% consumers rely on friends and family recommendations and additionally, 56% consumers regularly inform family regarding the products that are of interest to them.

Business Model / Business Working

The website works as a social shopping website with the help of volunteer workers who recommend products on the search box where they add the image and graphic for its representation. Below the representation description of the product is briefly described, to entice curiosity. The wide range of products that are recommended are subdivided into tags for providing it as a additional search option to make it easy for the customers to relate it to their interests. Because of the wide base of human resource of the website there are recommendations ranging from day to day products like iPods to bizarre articles like tattoo-covered pigs and necklaces for trees, which in turn helps various customers to relate wide range of products to their personal interests and needs.

The question that arises from the working is that why the worker would spend time in this process is also answered through its process i.e. it provides them with opportunities to build and augment their own brand names in online community. When these recommended products gain popularity, they are added to the ‘What's popular' list. "Member dashboard", reflecting real time ranking and feedbacks on the product recommendations of its members, accordingly the benefits and perks are distributed.

Value Proposition for the Recommender's

Benefits to the recommenders:-

1) Syndicate voice:-

Bloggers /writers write to be followed and for social recognition. Also, popular bloggers' lists might get picked up by third parties who want to run the bloggers list on their own site.

2) Social capital:-

Bloggers like to influence people and it helps