Because ignoring the conversations happening all around you is no longer an option, Eluma's VP of marketing and biz development suggests ways to embrace them.

Time Magazine summed up the essence of 2006 when it selected YOU as the person of the year. 

Says Time's Lev Grossman, "For seizing the reins of the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy … TIME's Person of the Year for 2006 is you." YOU -- as in you and me -- the average person.

And the average person is creating quite a stir for marketers. Why? Because the game has changed and users are now in control. They're deciding what messages they want to hear and how they want to hear them. They're connecting with their peers online and fueling the word-of-mouth phenomenon. In essence, they've turned the world upside down for brand and marketing professionals.

"The power is the consumer," said A.G. Lafley, chief executive of the Procter & Gamble Company at the recent annual conference of the Association of National Advertisers. "We need to learn to begin to let go and embrace trends like commercials created by consumers and online communities built around favorite products."

That's right. Your customers are talking about you -- what they like, what they don't like, their experiences with your stores, your employees, your website, even your advertising -- whether you like it or not. Now, in 2007, with the democratization of the web well underway, and absolutely no chance of turning back, do you really think you're still in control of your brand? 

So what can we do about it? We can ignore it and hope for the best. But with the popularity of MySpace, YouTube and over 65 million blogs (and 175,000 new ones each day) on the web, chances are pretty good that discussions are happening about your brand, whether you're participating or not. Savvy marketers realize that they too must harness the power of Web 2.0 and get involved in these conversations as a critical element of their marketing initiatives.

But how? Unfortunately, there is no one simple answer. Some brands choose to create MySpace profiles. Some seed content on Digg and YouTube. Some monitor the blogosphere to find the most influential bloggers and monitor (and participate in) the discussions. And many companies are building and hosting online communities, providing their customers with a secure, comfortable and recognizable place to interact. 

All of these initiatives involve giving up some control. But how much? Answering this question is a delicate balancing act for marketers-- but it's a question they have to address.

"One of the scary things for businesses in building an online community is the fact that, although they are providing the forum, they have only limited control over the conversations and actions that take place there," says Matthew Lees, vice president and consultant with the Patricia Seybold Group. "Even with well-defined topics and goals, community members will talk about what they want to talk about, and do what they want to do, which may not be completely in line with what the company -- the community sponsor -- wants."

Often, though, companies respond to uncertainty by turning to pretense and control. We saw this first-hand when Wal-Mart created MyHub-- the company's social network that it shut down after 10 weeks. The New York Times and Advertising Age both deemed it a failure because Wal-Mart couldn't resist the urge to control the community. The company's people edited user's content, took days to approve postings before going live, and showed videos of people who looked suspiciously like actors reading scripts. 

Exercising this level of control is anathema to the reasons individuals are drawn to social networks and the Web 2.0 world in the first place-- to express themselves freely, to engage in candid and genuine discussions, to be real. The minute marketers cross the fine line of control, trust within the community is lost. As Tom Hespos penned in his Online Spin blog, "When we seek to leverage community in order to give our brands a boost, our brands must be respectful of the community, in part by avoiding the temptation to work against its purpose."

I'm not going to profess that walking that fine line of control is easy. It can be challenging (especially for marketers that are clinging to the hope that we're still in control of our brands). But, here are five suggestions to help you keep your balance:

1) Be the master of ceremonies
The master of ceremonies doesn't interfere. He brings people together, and keeps the show going. In an online community, the brand should give consumers a place to talk and something to talk about-- and then get out of the way. The conversations about your brand are happening somewhere. Isn't it better to have them happen on your turf, where you can respond to inaccuracies, learn from customer feedback and enjoy the goodwill that stems from your customers' recognition that you're secure enough in your products and services that you're willing to let it all hang out on your site?

2) Let your users aggregate content that's not yours
Empower your users with the best new Web 2.0 technologies, like rating and tagging (think Digg), social bookmarking (think del.icio.us) and recommendations, so that consumers can share any content they find anywhere on the web within your community-- because if they can't do it on your site, they'll just go someplace else.

3) Set and enforce reasonable policies
While you need to let members express themselves freely, it's OK to have a clearly stated policy for when users cross the line. You can have a black list of words that get automatically filtered out of users' comments before they get posted. You can choose to remove individual posts that are offensive or distasteful. You can ban users that are repeat offenders. Or better yet, you can have your community vote to ban posts and users. 

4) Be honest
Resist the urge to create fake postings. Users can spot them in an instant, and your credibility will be shot. Resist the urge to remove or edit negative posts. If a post is factually inaccurate, and no one in your community responds to it, you can. If it's accurate, learn from it and fix the problem.

5) And finally, DO IT
Really. I have conversations with marketers all the time who know they should create online communities, and they really want to do it, but when it comes time to pull the trigger, they can't. Why? Because they are afraid of what people might say! As marketers, sometimes it can be really hard for us to let go.

Last year was a watershed year for the web. Web 1.0 is over, and we're firmly into Web 2.0. Ignoring the conversations that are happening all around you is no longer an option. We're all still learning how best to engage in the Web 2.0 world and how it's impacting the customer/brand relationship. But a few things are certain: Web 2.0 has wrested control of our brands from us, and has forever changed how we must market to our customers.

Joe Lichtenberg is vice president, marketing & business development for Eluma. Read full bio.