As communication and collaboration with and between consumers is becoming so cheap and the base of online customers so huge, the old marketing discipline of market research is getting a new impulse and as it appears(google it), even a new name.
I believe there is room for a consumer intelligence activity or department which should be a second view out of the company, next to (or integrated in the competitve and business intelligence departments, which keeps taps on consumers, and collaborations between consumers. But that is what marketing does you’ll say.
The difference is that this department should engage in communicating with these clients, getting those customers to collaborate with the company, making the (new and existing) businesses products, processes and services better for those clients. And that is something maketing never will do.
I’m not sure though if what i see in the results of google is even remotely near this interpretation I defined of this word. Many businesses still lack the “2.0″ consumer view. Time will tell what’s the hype and what’s the real useful part.
