I agree +Brian Solis ;) Emotions via the experience are the keys that opens the doors of behaviour. Connect and engage the emotion via context (experience), the rest will fall into place ie. positive or negative change of behaviour, positive or negative change of perspective towards a brand.

Social media is simply part of the toolset to achieving business success and enhancing the customer experience. It is like play doh. The question is, what will we do with our businesses using these social media tools to blow peoples minds for a positive result?

These days, the smartest thing for businesses to do is to let their stakeholders help shape/codevelop their business. Play doh.

+Brian Solis ...just dont mention Margaret Mead please ;) +Bear Grylls and +Anthony Bourdain have more credibility here.

If there's one thing I have been doing for years is going 'native' and that's coming from someone who's been described as a 'native'...lol.

Your 800% right Brian! going native is the only way to develop one's lens of understanding of 'the experiences' (whatever they are). 

As an 'experiential architect/brand navigator', shaping and steering experiences is proactive and designed (even the unplanned experience from the enduser). Anything else is chance and detrimentally risky to brands. Not only is everything measureable, and almost everything can be designed, executed and managed. This is unusual business. Having the ability to float like a butterfly and inspire like Ali, Marley and Bruce Lee.

Tangentially, what do these iconic personalities like Ali, Marley and Bruce Lee have in common? Their content is timeless and enjoyed today by millions. R.R.S. (Relevance. Resonance. Significance) achieved if not more so as two of these 'brands' are deceased. This is legacy territory. PS: I would add 'frequency' to this list too. 

When content is relevant to people, when they resonate and are significant, that creates a frequency (context) that people want to tune into time and time again (akin to your favorite song, movie, actor, car). The beautiful thing about frequency, businesses have the ability to shift their frequency (in fact they have too! Shifting the goalposts to literally challenge ones experiences beyond what people expect is not only a competitive advantage, it’s compulsory and necessary to stay in business. Getting 'used to something', falling victim to ones own success enables competition to create the better experience). On the successful end of the experiential scale, shifting the 'frequency' is the underlying essence of why "Call of Duty Black Ops 2" reached $1 billion in sales in 15 days. Better stories, better experiences and built in with a “to be continued” once the goal for that specific game is met. Future proof.

Understanding the tools of technology at a very deep level to where utility is second nature is crucial to shaping and steering experiences towards positive win-win outcomes for the creator and 'co-createe' (the end user/experiencer). Deep knowledge of the story, the end objective of the story, the storytelling tone and every possible experiential outcome from the storyline is important. 

Developing this 6th sense understanding of the holistic experience reduces risk of a negative outcome from an unpleasant experience which over time can be shaped into super positive outcomes. This is why I love crisis and chaos! The marginal returns of positive sentiment after a crisis are comparatively huge when executed well. Here's a little snapshot of how we handled things at ”The Internet Chef”. This is +Bridget Davis ~ The Internet Chef's TEDx talk here in Sydney http://youtu.be/eHfvCvY6mhM In this short video, she shares a little bit of how we handled a crisis and turned flamers into fanatics with an evolving recipe of how to shape and steer the experience.

This next link is one of our foundation ‘stellar experiences’ as written by one of our ‘family’ now in Sydney. By our definition, family are more than fans and ambassadors because they are with you through thick and thin. In my Tongan language, I would also call them ‘matapule’ or ‘talking chiefs’ because these are the family who do the talking for you and about your brand (= 3rd party referral ;)). This link following is +Tony Hollingsworth's personal experience of why our 'experiential-breaking' breakfast degustacion was the best breakfast he’s had in his life. Keep in mind, this is 2010 and we only knew Tony from Twitter and a local tweetup. The breakfast was a 'get to know' people session by breaking bread with them  http://asktonyfood.wordpress.com/2010/05/03/serendipity-community-bridget_cooks-and-the-best-breakfast-of-my-life/

I highlight these experiences in the links above to show people that what you’re writing about +Brian Solis is real, relevant and a necessity to understand. The tools and technology can be applied to any context, any niche of business. We just happen to be in food but we can apply our principles and learnings combined with your thoughts quite confidently into any industry. Your books simply cut the business mustard.

If businesses don’t adapt, don't engage, don’t learn, unlearn and apply, their businesses will die. We live and breathe unusual business every day and I can only say thank you Brian for what you have taught us via your books, blogs, social channels and videos. If you see our first cookbook released 2 weeks ago on Amazon, you'll discover that we probably developed a world first there too. Inspired by you and your work. 

We're just kids having fun and doing silly things in our kitchen, putting our dishes of content and context out there for all to see and improving them.

May we keep sharpening the iron.
the digital native ;)