The growth of social media in this new world of word of mouth has sparked many different questions and debates about the value of such strategies for business. One of the social advocates I admire most, Brian Solis, just released a book called Engage: The Complete Guide for Brands and Businesses to Build, Cultivate and Measure Success in the New Web. Another that I’ve integrated into my personal vocabulary is Seth Godin’s Tribes - here is Seth talking about it at the recent TED conference…

So many great advocates talking about so many different valuable insights for businesses to leach onto and turn into immediate success for their business.

I believe that the crux of all these valuable messages can be narrowed down to one simple thought – give your customers a seat at on your board.

Here are 3 reasons why this is so important (and easy to do effectively using social):

1 – You Can’t Afford Not To – Businesses have always preached “the customer always comes first” but in today’s world we have quickly turned into a society of “Me Media.” If you aren’t engaging with your customers and making them part of the decisions being made about your organization, services and brand – you will be replaced by a brand that cares.

2 – Your Customer Is Your Tribe…Or Should Be – As Seth Godin so accurately talks about in Tribes, your fastest route to amazing word of mouth is through the audiences that are already fans of your brand. Making them a part of making important decisions for your business will result in providing your tribe with the ammunition they need to fire off wonderful comments, reviews and opinions about your business.

3 – Reduce Costs – I know, this one should probably be first in today’s challenging economic times, but the reality is making your customer a real decision maker for your business means that you spend significantly less dollars on things like focus groups, market research, and hhhmmm marketing (yes, I just said that).

It has forever been a mystery to me why businesses fail to engage in this simple yet unbelievably effective process of making their customers an integral part of the decision-making process.

Let’s make today the last day that we don’t engage with our customers and make them a part of the solution.

I’ve seem many great examples of companies who are doing this such as Modcloth, Threadless, and Kayak. Do you have other great examples you can share?