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Notas do Editor
Market Knowledge: Competitors, Suppliers, Buyers, Influencers; Google insight, Google Alerts will provide a view on most companies within an industry. Also, there are a range of blogs and networks where amateurs and professionals will share their knowledge of a market. Customer Insight and Understanding: Listening to customers and prospects through the range of channels they inhabit; comments on YouTube, Networks where they ‘hang out’ Customer Interaction: the tools exist to not only listen and observe but also to discuss and converseBusiness Intelligence: media monitoring, alerts and related analysis tools provide a great source of structured Business Intelligence. You need not pay £600/month for the privilege, SocialMention and Google Alerts can keep you informed where you need to be. Reputation Management: one of the key aspects of web 2.0 is that it is Real Time. You can see and respond to comments as they arise and often, where the response is efficient and effective, create a positive effect. Consider, the Ethiopian Growers that challenged the coffee used by Starbucks in a video posted on YouTube. This video was viewed by 10,000 people. The CEO posted a response within 24 hours on YouTube, the response was viewed by several million.
We believe there is a strong correlation between positive word of mouth, online buzz and sales and marketing. Needless to say there are now numerous means of getting your message out there, growing followers (through sites like Twitter, and energising your customer base). Web 2.0 is immediate and direct. The example I like to use is of a safety harness company based in Edinburgh who considered using a traditional approach to International Sales and Marketing – find an agent, find prospects, etc. An alternative approach we suggested, used LinkedIn to find the Health And Safety Director of the largest Construction Project in the world. Now it is not a leap to suggest filming the harness on YouTube and sending an email with a link saying you are in Saudi Arabia and would he like to meet up. Numerous examples of customer insight and feedback leading to product improvement. Many car companies use Second Life to test their designs. A site called eBags sends out the latest designs to their top raters on the site. Internal cost savings. No 10 Downing Street example…Improved Operations and internal processes. There are applications for literally anything – wikis that compete with licenced intranets, email freeware that is better than Outlook, hosted network sites for £20/month that would cost £thousands to replicate. Increased Return on Investment. The holy grail or the achiles heal of Web 2.0. How do you make money from this thing…there is a growing level of evidence to suggest that it works.