There are a few things that we've learned from working with private sector clients. You can think about what you need to do with open data as almost being like marketing and the aspects of marketing which we think are applicable.
Number one is understanding the need that's out there. Just as a marketer wants to understand what product or service to deliver by deriving customer insight it's helpful for the government in this case to understand what the needs are for data out there. Ways to find out about that include convening groups, customer focus groups in this case. It would be commercial focus groups where you would actually ask companies what data would be most valuable to them. In fact, at our firm we've actually brought together groups of business executives and made them aware of some of the open data that was available from governments. They were actually surprised and said that this is something they can actually use. Being able to create that awareness which is the first part of marketing is incredibly important.
Then there's continuing to understand.... Right now open data efforts are often supply driven. You know, there's a bunch of data and we'll just throw it out there. Again, you need that demand signal to come back through an open dialogue with your “customers”.