The Social Commerce Handbook: 20 Secrets for Turning Social Media into Social Sales

SECRET 14FLIP THE FUNNEL

Give your fans the power to speak up.

—SETH GODIN

GIFFGAFF

Alan works for Giffgaff, a British pay-as-you-go mobile network. Actually, you could say he runs the company. Yet he doesn’t actually work for Giffgaff; Alan is not an employee in the traditional sense, but he, along with Giffgaff’s thousands of other customers, have an ownership stake, thanks to a philosophy upon which the company is based: “mutuality.”

The company’s name comes from an old Scottish word, giffgaff, which means “mutual giving.” That idea serves as the philosophical framework upon which Giffgaff is built. Even its tagline—“the mobile network run by you”—tells the story. There is a real sense of partnership—mutuality—that exists between the company ...