Finding value in Web 2.0

The rise of blogs, micro-blogs and Wikis, to name but some of the new online tools now available to the enterprise and popularly referred to as Web 2.0, has seen lots of interest but substantially less implementation from business.

The reasons are numerous and range from inflexibility in large scale IT systems and blueprints that won't allow wide scale implementation of these tools, to a fear that employees will misuse communication platforms to damage company reputation or that it will simply undermine productivity.

Let us clarify one important point upfront. Facebook is not Web 2.0. Nobody expects you to roll out company-wide implementation or even allow employees access in work time to social networks. A significant proportion of businesses ban access to social network sites from their offices and few executives would find fault with that.

That does not mean the tools available can't be put to good use in the corporate environment. Also, face the fact that your employees will use these tools after hours regardless of your opinion on them. In fact, a recent report by Forrester Research indicates that if you wait too long with making Web 2.0 tools available internally, "employees may create their own collaborative environments on the Web". This effectively means that if you don't, they will, outside the structures you should have established to manage the processes in the first place, in the public sphere, and using disparate systems that ultimately won't allow for easy IT integration at some future point.

Internal blogs encourage employee participation and foster a sense of community, research shows.

Herman Manson, journalist and editor, Mark magazine

The benefits of Web 2.0 for businesses are quite clear, if not always tested. For the enterprise the value lies in rolling out these tools internally for now - CEO and selected employee blogs being the exception - but more about that later.

Internal blogs encourage employee participation and foster a sense of community, research shows. Collaborative projects spanning various locations definitely benefits from better communication tools, notes Gino Cosme, founder of consultancy Cosmedia.

Blogs can also decrease e-mail usage, as only high priority messages would need to be sent out with other relevant content landing on internal blogs. Blogs are great tools to build up networks - something that could allow managers to survey talent for future recruitment.

A wiki (which content any authorised person can edit - think Wikipedia) is another Web 2.0 technology and can be used to collect workplace knowledge into a single source, which is especially important considering the lack of skills and knowledge many businesses face today. It keeps the collective knowledge of departing or retiring employees within the organisation.

Micro-blog services (where content is limited to around 140 characters), like the popular Twitter, allow for streams of relevant alerts to flow to employees - once again without the need for e-mail. Then there is company-wide social networks tools to replace typical employee directories, or as Forrester puts it, providing context to content.

Siemens South Africa has rolled out an intranet site tailored to its Web community of online marketers and communicators within the Siemens group. It provides the platform for idea sharing and education via blogs, wikis, citizen journalism, podcasts and streaming video.

"There are also plans in place to roll out an extensive Web 2.0 external approach as part of the new global corporate campaign, 'Siemens Answers', although we are awaiting final details,” says Dale Ladner, online communications manager at Siemens. The CEO, sector heads and divisional management communicate important information to staff via regularly updated blogs on the various intranet sites within Siemens locally. Streaming video and podcasts are also used for this purpose. Ladner says employees respond well to blogs and they are regularly in the Top 20 most visited pages on the Siemens intranet.

"We see an increase in efficiency simply because employees are better informed, often in real-time, or close to it," says Ladner. "Moving forward, it will be about managing perceptions. We are trying to change the old-school, clock-watching mentality that views Web 2.0 technologies with suspicion. Quite frankly, we would not be overly concerned with how much time employees spent engaging on Web 2.0 platforms, provided they deliver on expectations. Indeed, these technologies can only help breed a discursive corporate culture and they are well aligned with our brand DNA as a technology company."

A strategy for blogs and social networking services outside the protection of a corporate firewall tend to centre on communicating brand insights and engaging consumers in their preferred medium.

A number of South African firms have come up with successful external Web 2.0 strategies, including BMW South Africa - its Facebook page just passed 5 000 fans. "We've had fantastic feedback and interaction on our [Facebook] discussion forums,” says Scott Gray, interactive manager at BMW South Africa.

Its YouTube video channel, says Scott, has enjoyed over 1.4 million views, while the channel it hosts on local video-sharing site Zoopy is also growing. BMW doesn't plan on rolling out any of these tools internally, at least not now. "I think that people are used to the way they do their daily work, and introducing systems and channels for them to share more information as well as collaborate on it is going to require huge change management encouragement and patience," says Gray.

Financial services company The Unlimited World is rolling out an informal, but company-wide, education programme called 'A Brown Bag', where Mark Smith, the firm's online marketing manager, takes staff through the principles of search, and then into blogging, PPC, RSS feeds, wikis, and social media. Smith says while employee blogs remain internal, he plans to help employees who wish to have external blogs with the tools and knowledge to set these up. An external CEO blogging strategy will be rolled out soon. Its marketing department is already using Basecamp to improve productivity and RSS feeds and wikis to keep project details in one place.

Internationally, service, creative and technology companies especially use employee blogs that have built up industry credibility to link back to their corporate sites. It gives business a human face: “Look, real people work there!”

Issues such as privacy, intellectual property rights and freedom of expression remain, but these can be dealt with if clear policies and guidelines are put into place. Rob Stokes, CEO of Quirk eMarketing, does note that if a corporate blog is totally sanitised by the PR or legal department, it will more than likely fail to connect with its readers. "The challenge, therefore, is finding a balance between voice and control, and this is different for every company," says Stokes.

Cosme suggests that it wouldn't harm employers to negotiate these policies with staff, which in turn empowers them. When done during the strategy development phase, this could provide further insight into how social media can add value to the company.

Strategies, like that being implemented by Siemens, are exciting. But as Ladner notes, it remains vital to stay mindful of who you are speaking to, your target audience. “We will not use any tool or technology just because it is popular, we will use it where it makes sense and it can add value to our stakeholders, customers and our organisation,” says Ladner. After all, “a fool with a tool is still a fool”.

* Herman Manson is a journalist and the editor of Mark magazine. He blogs at http://www.marklives.com.