Started our Coworking Research Project

[sk...@emergentresearch.com]

I mentioned on this group a few months ago that Emergent Research (my
company) was considering conducting a research project on coworking.
We are going forward with the project and started a few weeks ago.

The project details are on our new project blog - www.coworkinglabs.com,
which is still very much in beta form and a work in progress:). We
soft launched the project today with a post describing our plans on
www.smallbizlabs.com.

We are partnering with the non-profit think tank The Society for New
Communcations Research (www.sncr.org) on this project.

Our project plan includes two surveys. One of coworking owners/
facility managers and the other of coworking facility users. We also
plan on creating a census of U.S. coworking facilities working
cooperatively with other groups who are creating directories. We will
also be conducting in-person and phone interviews.

In terms of timing, we're developing the surveys - which will be as
short and as simple as we can make them - and will field them this
summer. We hope to have the research completed this fall.

Our goals are: (1) develop a solid estimate of the size of the
coworking market (facilities and users); (2) gain an understanding of
how users view and use coworking facilities; (3) understand the roles
social media and connective technologies play in coworking; (4) to
make a stab at forecasting where coworking is going and its role in
the future of work.

As we get deeper into this work, our goals may change based on
feedback, input from folks we interview and what we find
interesting.

For now I am just alerting the group to this work. As we get to the
survey stage we will be reaching out and looking for help getting
facility managers/owners and facility users to fill out our surveys.

We will update this group as we progess.

Thanks,

Steve

[Jacob Sayles]

Interesting work!  I'm excited to see where it goes.

Jacob

---
Office Nomads - Individuality without Isolation
http://www.officenomads.com -  (206) 323-6500

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group.
To post to this group, send email to cowo...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to coworking+...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en.

[John Sechrest]

This is very interesting work.

One of the questions that I have been wondering about is where the Co-working members get their  clients. If you are a coworking  member, who are your customers and how do you get them?

Any chance you could ask this kind of question? I have about 3-4 different questions around that issue to help me understand how we support and enhance the co-working participants.

On Fri, Jun 4, 2010 at 9:28 AM, sk...@emergentresearch.com <sk...@emergentresearch.com> wrote:

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group.
To post to this group, send email to cowo...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to coworking+...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en.

--
John Sechrest          .        
Corvallis Benton        .            
   Chamber Coalition      .          
      420 NW 2nd                   .        
             (541) 757-1507              . sech...@corvallisedp.com
                                                                     .        
                                                                                   .

[Dave Ruzius]

Interesting project indeed and curious about the outcomes as well.

John, regarding your question. Do you mean where coworking places get
their members (how they build their community) or where coworkers find
their clients?

In case of the first... as Alex says, community first ! Get out there
where you can find people that have a problem (working alone) and a
potential wish to work better together. Evangelise Coworking, present,
Jelly, connect and build a community of fellow Coworkers that may (or
may not) finally decide to work at your space.

In case of the second, this depends on eveyones individual business,
there way of lead generation that fits their business etc. Yes,
Coworking may open new channels for business but it starts with good
old networking, (social) marketing etc.
Feel free to checkout a small presentation I did on business
development for SMB. Basically it covers; find, get found, show off,
be different.

http://www.slideshare.net/theworkscz/businessdevelopmentcreativecoffee

Grts

TheWorks
Dave Ruzius
http://www.theworks.cz

--
Dave Ruzius
http://www.theworks.cz

[John Sechrest]

On Fri, Jun 4, 2010 at 4:07 PM, Dave Ruzius <da...@theworks.cz> wrote:

Interesting project indeed and curious about the outcomes as well.

John, regarding your question. Do you mean where coworking places get
their members (how they build their community) or where coworkers find
their clients?

I mean where coworkers find their clients.

 

In case of the first... as Alex says, community first ! Get out there
where you can find people that have a problem (working alone) and a
potential wish to work better together. Evangelise Coworking, present,
Jelly, connect and build a community of fellow Coworkers that may (or
may not) finally decide to work at your space.

In case of the second, this depends on eveyones individual business,
there way of lead generation that fits their business etc. Yes,
Coworking may open new channels for business but it starts with good
old networking, (social) marketing etc.

Yes, I agree that this is how we would advise people to find clients. My question is a demographic question. Of the people who are successful co-workers, how many of them are remote workers for large companies? How many of them are freelancers with a word of mouth marketing. How many of them are part of a distributed startup?

It would be good to hear from the coworkers themselves about how they are engaged. the answer would change how Economic development agencies can help and where they should focus their efforts to support coworkers.