Despite its image as a consumer-focused technology, Web 2.0 has the potential to deliver valuable business benefits:
- Web 2.0 allows firms to get closer to customers, conduct R&D, and track usage patterns
- Facebook is used as a networking tool by 130,000 businesses, such as Virgin and Disney, to encourage fan sites, and create the means to opt in to marketing.
- Thousands of advertisers are coming to the site and reaching reaching people, according to Facebook
- Facebook’s 130 million active users generally like using new applications to share information –businesses are now developing their own applications to reach users
- The common interpretation – and common mistake – among CEOa is that sites such as a Facebook and Myspace are for “time-wasters”.
- Social networking tools used in everyday business has been shown to increase efficiency; according to research, 64 per cent of employees using them claim to be more organised, while 46 per cent say networking sparks ideas and creativity
- The top five tools being used in organisations are: collaboration sites on intranets (39 per cent); internal forums (20 per cent); shared videos (16 per cent); social networks, such as Facebook or LinkedIn (15 per cent); and external collaboration sites on the web and internal blogging sites (11 per cent)
- The BBC is behind one of the most successful Web 2.0 projects – iPlayer, because it is easily consumed
(Source: ComputerWeekly)
