Web 2.0 - What does it mean for your business?
By Robyn Logan,
Director of Strategy, ICA
Web 2.0 is a term that is still being defined to a certain extent. To get a quick understanding check out the wikipedia definition:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_2.0
And here is another definition I came across this week:
“Web-based applications and services that make it easy to create, distribute and share content (often collaboratively), while helping users find and connect with like-minded people and form social networks based on common interests. It is also described as the Read/Write web.”
Apart from the obviously amazing technologies, I have become interested in the philosophies and principles around web 2.0 as they apply to business. So by that I mean how these new ways of doing things online change the way you need to think about business and in particular your relationship with your customers and their relationship with you. Mainly I am interested in the following:
~ the control shift: Instead of providers/broadcasters controlling the message, users are controlling the message. And this is not just the “what” but the “how” and the “when” Those companies who stay in denial about this and continue to operate only in “transmit” mode will suffer.
~ the increase in transparency: The days of big corporations hiding their policies and dishing out shocking customer service are gone. Instead we see a new wave of companies that use blogs and wikis to honestly communicate their values and principles.
~ users & customers adding value: Providing ways your users can contribute to your product or service, rather than doing all the work behind closed doors and dishing it up once its cooked. Trusting your users as co-developers - of course open source software is the ultimate example here.
At ICA our training is fully online and for me embracing web 2.0 means implementing the following changes:
- using a blog to expose the people and the thinking behind the company
- inviting and ~ not editing ~ student feedback
- allowing our students to co-create our curriculum by creating a wiki for certain sections
- using the collective intelligence in our student body to create new products and services (setting up an R&D listserv)
Basically - pulling down the fences and letting them in. At all levels.
I could go on….I guess the main thing I’ve realised is that to be fully successful as a web 2.0 company you have to have integrity and loads of it - without that you will fail. I will leave you with two examples of how I see businesses either adopting (or not!) web 2.0 philosophies.
Example One: Open source software
This debate between 2 online sales database developers shows how you can use your customers to create your brand. Very briefly Sugar CRM developed the software under an open source license. Their basic version is free, then they sell a “professional version” which has more features. vTiger then took that software, added extra features and are selling it at less than half the price of Sugar CRM. The ensuing debate (which is some of the best bedtime reading I’ve had in ages) was all open to the public via the vTiger forum. http://www.vtiger.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11
I don’t profess to know if there is a “right” and “wrong” position here. But I do know that through the integrity of their responses vTiger used this debate to successfully create their brand. I know a lot of people who switched from Sugar to vTiger after reading the exchange.
Example Two: Pontiac advertising on TV, which ends with ‘don’t take our word for it. google pontiac’.
The GM of Pontiac basically admits that people don’t trust mass-marketing anymore and that only the internet has enough integrity left. http://localzing.com/blog/local-advertising/gm-says-google-pontiac/
He says: “We’re touting Google, frankly, because it stands for credibility and consumer empowerment, and we like the association.”
Killer quote:
“GM seems to think that associating with such a trusted and generally unbiased brand that some of that might rub off on GM/Pontiac. GM’s head of sales and marketing said in Business Week: We’re touting Google, frankly, because it stands for credibility and consumer empowerment, and we like the association.”
That’s web2.0!