Social Media 2.0
Social Media has become a
well-understood term for Internet entrepreneurs, digital marketers and
enterprises. Often one relates social media to the emergence of social networks
like Facebook, LinkedIn, Ning, Twitter, SiliconIndia.com, You tube etc. These
networks of people and content provide a platform for users to express
themselves and allow for user generated content. SiliconIndia.com itself has over 2.5 million Indian professionals
networked to help each other with their career goals and entrepreneurial
ambitions. These large networks offer a great platform for marketers and
advertisers to reach out to users. That explains, why Facebook is on its way to
doing $1 Billion in revenue, if it attempted to monetize its current ad
inventory. But, one of the key questions on everyone’s mind is that where is
“social media” headed and what does it mean for traditional businesses to take
advantage of this phenomenon. Clearly, many businesses can use the power of
viral marketing and communication in Facebook, linkedin, and youtube etc. to
get the word out about their products or services, but is that an appropriate
social media strategy today? How can one tap the fullest potential of social
media – that is a question for all executives and entrepreneurs?
Beyond
social networks 1.0
Social media is on its way to become a
mainstream media not just for the early adopters like Facebook, LinkedIn,
Youtube’s of the world, but the opportunity now extends to each and every
business in the world. The notion is that every web and Internet strategy must
be relooked from a “social lense” and one has to understand how it must embrace
the social web. Web sites are no more a broadcast media, where the company
offers up to communicate to the world about its product and services whether in
B-to-B or B-to-C environments. The company must now engage its entire community
of users, customers, prospects, and employees in a level playing field, yet
maintaining editorial and quality control, to drive their web strategy.
Let me take an example from
SiliconIndia.com itself. SiliconIndia has been traditionally a magazine, where
the SiliconIndia employees were producing great content, and its web site did a
good job of sharing the content online. The challenge was that back in 2006 it
was not leveraging its user base to create and grow the content needed to
accomplish its vision. Over the last two years, SiliconIndia.com has done a
wonderful job of transforming itself from a news web site to a true social
media where over millions of professionals are expressing themselves through
all the social tools, yet maintaining the quality control and editorial control
of a news site. This transformation to social media is a great example of how
every business has to see itself in the future.
Another example, I can share is from
Metricstream, which is a market leader in Governance, Risk and compliance
enterprise software. Being an enterprise software company, one would think that
it had little to do with social media. But, quite on the contrary, Metricstream
has now created “ComplianceOnline.com” one of the largest online communities
for governance, risk and compliance professionals, who are connected with each
other and sharing their professional knowledge. SiliconIndia.com and
ComplianceOnline.com are two completely different yet successful examples of
social media, from two completely different market segments. But they both
illustrate how one can create effective social media strategies. For both Metricstream and siliconindia, the
benefits of social media strategies have been significant. Metricstream offers
webinars on complianceonline through the experts in the “cloud” and is able to
create relationships with prospects as they enter the sales funnel.
Metricstream is also able to monetize its funnel by turning prospects into paid
customers for webinars, thereby generating significant revenues and profits for
the company.
Now is a good time for entrepreneurs
and companies to relook at their web strategy and ask the tough question – Are
you indeed engaging your entire user base in helping create the value
proposition for your web site? If the answer is partial Yes or a No, you are on
your way to extinction! That sounds too harsh but could be the wave of the
future.
Traditional Web is dead
Facebook now has 200 million members,
and growing. Imagine as they reach a billion people over the next three years.
How hard is it for them to add a search engine capability right from the
comfort from your social network? What does that mean for Google? Well, google
has to redefine itself, or else it faces significant threat from facebook.
Just, few years back Google looked invincible. But, today the world is
different. Facebook has done a good job of embracing social media, google has
failed to innovate.
Another good example of the
far-reaching impact of digital web is seen in the print industry. Newspapers
and magazines are under significant attack from online usage, and shift of
revenues online. These news agencies must transform themselves and turn their readers
and users into true participants in the news creation process, not just as
passive readers. Companies who do a good job will survive and thrive; others
will face threat of extinction. SiliconIndia has done a good job in redefining
itself into a social media company through its business model innovation. Many
more news, publishing, magazine companies will have to embrace social media or
else face serious threat of declining viewership.
Large companies like Pfizer, Citibank,
IBM, Infosys, Cisco, BMW also have to think about their web and Internet
strategies through the lense of social media. Are they doing enough to engage
and create a social platform for their user base, or are they still stuck in
the traditional mindset of broadcast media? If these companies don’t embrace
the social web to its fullest potential, some one else will.
Tremendous opportunities for
Entrepreneurs
As social media moves from early
adopters to mainstream, entrepreneurs can seize significant business
opportunities. Most businesses don’t get the social web, and are looking for
help through tools, technologies and services. Also, leading Internet sites
must be challenged by next generation social sites, which do a good job in
embracing and enhancing user participation. Nextag.com leads
comparison-shopping and has built itself into a significant business; perhaps,
the time has come for an entrepreneurial startup to redefine
comparison-shopping using social concepts. One can come up with numerous
examples like these. You can look at each and every segment of the Internet –
comparison-shopping, jobs and career, news, communication, online shopping,
publishing etc – and look for how effectively can one drive a social strategy,
leapfrogging the current incumbents in these segments.
Of late, we have seen significant
meltdown in global financial markets. Citibank, Bank of America, and every
large financial institution is stuck with huge issues. Is it time for a social
media company to dream the next generation community bank and financial institution
of the future. Perhaps, we can get away with less bail-out capital than the
trillions thrown at these traditional institutions!
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