In today’s socially networked and wired world, anyone can communicate with millions of people with a simple click of a mouse. This incredible power was a dream of those who created the Internet, but today it is a reality — evidenced by the political revolutions throughout the Middle East being credited to the likes of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

While these revolutionary changes are amazing to watch from afar, another transformation is impacting us right here in home building. In fact, many builders have had the Internet turned against them and their companies, leaving them not always excited about “progress.”

Consultants Chip Bell and John Patterson have teamed up again to write a seminal book on why and how businesses must adapt to meet an increasingly wired and socially networked customer base.

How do you protect your company’s reputation in this unbridled new world? You arm your company with new Internet-based strategies to monitor, manage, and prevent attacks.

Chip Bell and John Patterson  — renowned authors, speakers, and consultants to Fortune 1000 companies — are publishing a new book titled Wired and Dangerous due out this summer. “More than sounding a warning for all who serve customers, this book provides a compelling rationale for the restlessness of today’s customers and gives “concrete solutions for turning customer admonition into approval and annoyance into advocacy,” the authors write.

And since Chip is a gracious person and a friend, he’s allowed me to share some excerpts from this seminal work before its published.

As the book makes clear, customer service has profoundly changed in the digital age, and with it the techniques for maintaining a stellar reputation.

Today, the customer really is king. Enabled and equipped by the Internet, with its capacity to instantly reach a gazillion fellow customers with the click of a mouse, customers can bring any service provider to its knees. The new normal customer, with this newfound strength, is no more the small and subservient victim of the stereotypically colossal and greedy corporation of yesteryear. The tables of the customer relationship have been turned. Plentiful product and service information has created a more mature customer. Customers today are wired and dangerous.

A new book by Chip Bell and John Patterson tackles the new phenomenon whereby satisfied customers might tell three friends, but dissatisfied customers will readily tell 3,000 with the click of a mouse.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the area of word-of-mouth advertising. Always a valuable form of marketing, word of mouth has morphed into “word of mouse,” as consumers have moved online to voice their opinions about everything from the girl who hands out towels at the gym to the guy who makes lattes at the corner cafe. As the authors entertainingly point out:

The Service Museum would likely have a special display on the infamous Word of Mouth. It has been the historical means by which customers learned about great service and lousy service beyond their own experience. Sure, they could read the PR drivel and advertising claims the company crafted, but that transmission was suspect to all but the most gullible and uninformed. We kinda sorta trusted the brand spokespersons — fictitious ones like Betty Crocker, Aunt Jemima, and Mr. Clean, as well as real ones like Michael Jordan, George Foreman, and Florence Henderson. And, there were also the surrogate judges — the Good Housekeeping Seal, the Better Business Bureau, and J.D. Power — that gave us some degree of assurance. But, the most trusted source was what Larry next door had to say.

The computer mouse changed all that. Word of Mouse has replaced word of mouth as the most viral means of gossip, grousing and groaning about last night’s slow restaurant service, yesterday’s rude sales clerk, or this morning’s glitch on Acme.com. … today’s Internet connections, whether blogs, tweets, or other forms of social media, have five times the impact of traditional word of mouth.

To emphasize their point, the authors present a lot of real-life examples, such as this OMG moment involving a famous musician and a now infamous airline:

After musician Dave Carroll learned from fellow passengers that United Airlines baggage handlers were damaging his guitar on the tarmac, he was unable to find anyone at United willing to make the situation right, so he made a music video about his woes. He posted the video on YouTube, chronicling in humorous detail United’s failure to provide appropriate service and their limp approach to repairing or reconciling the situation. This negative view of the United brand has been viewed by well over 9 million people! This juicy cyber battle has been cited endlessly as an example of what not to do both in the media and in print. According to a blog written by The Economist and posted on July 24, 2009, the Dave Carroll incident cost United Airlines 10 percent of share value, or about $180 million!

Indeed, social media has made griping a global pastime. And today’s consumers — who have become increasingly “picky, fickle, vocal, and vain” — are eager to share their grievances online with anyone who will listen. In describing today’s consumers, the authors point out:

They are picky in that they are more cautious in their choices (and they have many more choices) than customers of yesteryear and are interested only in getting obvious value for their money. They are more informed about the choices available, smarter in choice-making, and more selective in whom they elect to join. They are fickle in that they are much quicker to leave if unhappy. They show a lower tolerance for error, and will exit even when the service is merely indifferent.

Customers today are vocal in that they are both quick and loud in registering concerns based on their higher standards for value and their expectation of getting a tailored response. They assertively tell others their views of an organization’s service; they also pay attention to fellow customers’ negative reviews and make choices without even giving the organization a chance. A 2009 Nielsen online survey of 25,000 consumers in more than fifty countries found that customers trusted friends, family, and peers for product recommendations 90 percent of the time. Finally, they are vain in that they expect treatment that telegraphs they are special and unique.

In addition to outlining the problem in great detail, Bell and Patterson spend a lot of time providing solutions — pragmatic recipes “for delivering better service while improving long-term relationships with customers “ — all of which require real initiative from companies. As the authors write:

Customers admire service providers who care enough about their organization’s reputation to fight the good fight. You cannot remain silent. But, fight fiction with facts; meet hysteria with confidence. The more customers witness your passion rather than your anger, the more your intervention will be viewed as a mark of marketplace character, not as a defensive gesture aimed at trying to duck the spotlight.

As another author, Pete Blackshaw, points out, “To live in a world where consumers now control the conversation and where satisfied customers tell three friends while angry customers tell 3,000, companies must achieve credibility on every front.” Wired and Dangerous explores how companies can do that, which is why it’s “must” reading for every home builder.

Paul Cardis is founder and CEO of AVID Ratings, the leading provider of customer loyalty research and consulting to the home-building industry. Through the AVID system, home builders improve referrals, reduce warranty costs, and strengthen their brands. He can be reached at paul.cardis@avidratings.com