The Business Web 2.0
As CEO of business-based social networking site WeCanDo.BIZ, read my take on the role Web 2.0 technologies can play helping businesses to grow.
Tuesday 30 September 2008, 1:51 PM
Old economy woes catch up with Web 2.0 businesses
Social networking site Uber.com closed its doors yesterday after investors refused to stump up more cash to support it.
A note on the company's website reveals that existing investors are unable to continue a lifeline due to "the crisis in the economy" according to management. However, as of writing a short reprieve has been offered by Sharenow.com in order to assist the founders in finding an alternative source of income.
This comes the same month that eCirkit, a social network for "artists and thrill seekers" also shut down.
So does this indicate that social networking was a fad?
My view is that if you opened a toy shop and expected to run it as a long term business when everyone plays with the toys but no-one buys, it wouldn't work out. Why should Web 2.0 businesses have to play by different rules?
I see no signs of solid social networks like Xing closing any time soon. But you do have to wonder what the future is for sites like Twitter, where there is no operating income and where the money men they subject to the biggest cash crisis since the 1930s...
The sooner we get our premium membership level at WeCanDo.BIZ launched, the better!
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
Friday 26 September 2008, 4:11 PM
Facebook’s future as a search engine
A roundtable hosted at the Emerging Technology Conference at MIT puts money on Facebook doing search better than Google.
I have long been saying that Google is broken. When you want a PR company in Huddersfield and get 92,000 items back, you know it’s broken (there are only 146,000 people in Huddersfield and some of them will be children — is every adult in the town really a PR professional?). There are, in fact, no more than ten PR companies in the town and not one of them has a direct link from Page 1 of Google when you search for them. Either Google is useless and we just take it all for granted (it still has 80% of market share) or there are no SEO companies in Huddersfield helping the PR companies out (not the case: Google says there are 11,800…).
The problem with Google’s search is that every time I ask it for something, it forgets that we ever spoke. It is like going up to a stranger in the street and saying “PR company, Huddersfield” in terms of the value of what you get back. Strike that, because a stranger is likely to be honest enough to say they can’t help you.
The thing is that offline, we would never go back to anyone and ask for their help if they just gave us rubbish every time we asked them. We’d go straight to those folks we know and trust to give a personal recommendation and a reliable answer. This is what we all hoped Ask might do some years back. And this is perhaps where Facebook is better qualified than Google.
Josh Catone’s blog at Sitepoint reports on a roundtable at EMT hosted by Robert Scoble which had Dave Morin from Facebook, David Recordon from Six Apart, Joseph Smarr from Plaxo, and Nova Spivack from Radar Networks on the panel. What emergedas a dicussion about the power that social networks could give search to make results much more relevant.
Imagine asking someone for a PR company in Huddersfield, but they know why you might be asking because of the job you have. And them asking other people in Huddersfield, or perhaps even people you know who know about PR, before they give you a reply. OK, Facebook may in fact not be the best place for business related searches. But their database holds the details of more than 100 million people, including who their relations and friends are, where they live, where they work, what they like doing, what movies and books they like, where they go on holiday and a whole lot more. Beacon was a clumsy attempt at presenting endorsements to help influence the buying decisions of others and there is little doubt that Mark Zuckerberg knows what he is sitting on. But perhaps what is really needed is a holistic and contextual search which means no matter what you type into Facebook (for example, clubs in Huddersfield), you get back results based on why I might be asking (do I list clubbing as an activity I enjoy, or is it book clubs?) and what people I know (or who they trust) have to say about them.
Personal referrals from people you trust are always ranked higher than spurious recommendations from strangers in real life. How long can it be until social networks exploit this fact online and change the face of search forever?
Google has to be scared.
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
I have long been saying that Google is broken. When you want a PR company in Huddersfield and get 92,000 items back, you know it’s broken (there are only 146,000 people in Huddersfield and some of them will be children — is every adult in the town really a PR professional?). There are, in fact, no more than ten PR companies in the town and not one of them has a direct link from Page 1 of Google when you search for them. Either Google is useless and we just take it all for granted (it still has 80% of market share) or there are no SEO companies in Huddersfield helping the PR companies out (not the case: Google says there are 11,800…).
The problem with Google’s search is that every time I ask it for something, it forgets that we ever spoke. It is like going up to a stranger in the street and saying “PR company, Huddersfield” in terms of the value of what you get back. Strike that, because a stranger is likely to be honest enough to say they can’t help you.
The thing is that offline, we would never go back to anyone and ask for their help if they just gave us rubbish every time we asked them. We’d go straight to those folks we know and trust to give a personal recommendation and a reliable answer. This is what we all hoped Ask might do some years back. And this is perhaps where Facebook is better qualified than Google.
Josh Catone’s blog at Sitepoint reports on a roundtable at EMT hosted by Robert Scoble which had Dave Morin from Facebook, David Recordon from Six Apart, Joseph Smarr from Plaxo, and Nova Spivack from Radar Networks on the panel. What emergedas a dicussion about the power that social networks could give search to make results much more relevant.
Imagine asking someone for a PR company in Huddersfield, but they know why you might be asking because of the job you have. And them asking other people in Huddersfield, or perhaps even people you know who know about PR, before they give you a reply. OK, Facebook may in fact not be the best place for business related searches. But their database holds the details of more than 100 million people, including who their relations and friends are, where they live, where they work, what they like doing, what movies and books they like, where they go on holiday and a whole lot more. Beacon was a clumsy attempt at presenting endorsements to help influence the buying decisions of others and there is little doubt that Mark Zuckerberg knows what he is sitting on. But perhaps what is really needed is a holistic and contextual search which means no matter what you type into Facebook (for example, clubs in Huddersfield), you get back results based on why I might be asking (do I list clubbing as an activity I enjoy, or is it book clubs?) and what people I know (or who they trust) have to say about them.
Personal referrals from people you trust are always ranked higher than spurious recommendations from strangers in real life. How long can it be until social networks exploit this fact online and change the face of search forever?
Google has to be scared.
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
Thursday 11 September 2008, 12:53 PM
XING proves business people will pay to network online
Europe's answer to LinkedIn has 500,000 paying members; who else can show a 8% premium member base?
XING AG of Germany, widely billed as Europe's answer to LinkedIn of the US, has announced it has added 140,000 paying members to its base of over 6 million business networking members in the eight months of this year so far.
This takes its premium base to over 500,000, representing a consistent 8% of its overall membership numbers.
It has also reported revenues doubled and profits tripled.
At any time this would be a healthy set of results, but in current economic climes it is amazing, especially given the cynicism that surrounds the long-term viability of many Web 2.0 businesses, who have been unsuccessful in "monetizing" large user numbers.
Not many social networks charge for access, but XING proves that if you have something of value people will pay to get it. We anticipated this in the business plan for WeCanDo.BIZ and add our premium level subscription next month, charging close to the subscription levied by XING for access to leads, referrals and more member data.
I wonder what proportion of users pay to access LinkedIn?
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
XING AG of Germany, widely billed as Europe's answer to LinkedIn of the US, has announced it has added 140,000 paying members to its base of over 6 million business networking members in the eight months of this year so far.
This takes its premium base to over 500,000, representing a consistent 8% of its overall membership numbers.
It has also reported revenues doubled and profits tripled.
At any time this would be a healthy set of results, but in current economic climes it is amazing, especially given the cynicism that surrounds the long-term viability of many Web 2.0 businesses, who have been unsuccessful in "monetizing" large user numbers.
Not many social networks charge for access, but XING proves that if you have something of value people will pay to get it. We anticipated this in the business plan for WeCanDo.BIZ and add our premium level subscription next month, charging close to the subscription levied by XING for access to leads, referrals and more member data.
I wonder what proportion of users pay to access LinkedIn?
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
Wednesday 10 September 2008, 2:01 PM
Is the word "social" stigmatising Web 2.0?
I've thought about it and the social web isn't social at all.
I have just had an interesting conversation with Matthew Brazil, MD of 6Consulting and an expert in social media monitoring, about some changes we've made to the WeCanDo.BIZ website this week. The changes were made necessary by a small number of users on our system incorrectly using (perhaps by choice) a feature we have that allows our members to "tweet" their most urgent business need, which we then send to matched businesses who may be able to help. We've now added a filter which means that the Biz Needs do not go out live, but are approved by our staff first before broadcast. Having read some let's say "inappropriate" Biz Needs coming through recently Matthew understood our motivation for doing it, but asked what people would think of us trying to police social media.
We had a long chat about this and my conclusion was that the use of the term "social" when applied to most Web 2.0 resources is incorrect. Not only is it suggesting the services provided are done so for the greater good, but it's also implying that many of the services are the stuff of community staple and should be as free as green spaces and fresh air. This is preventing more carefully management of such services that could easily be shown to provide value enough that people would pay.
Now I see Web 2.0 from the business angle, let me be clear. But even if you look at social networks and social media aimed at all and sundry, such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, there are commercial organisations behind these who are not providing those services out of altruism, but for a commercial gain (although most are yet to recognise how). With reputations to maintain, terms of use and legal responsibilities, are these places actually ever the place for free expression that everyone thinks?
This becomes truer still when you look at how other commercial organisations use such facilities to help promote their brand. Although they are buying into the community spirit, no one wants their brand ripped to pieces or associated with the sorts of comments you can see attached to YouTube videos or Facebook fan pages. It can only be a matter of time before the providers of such services start to take notice when those providing their revenue ask for the community to get cleaner. I can understand such a request entirely, but also recognise that if you police a gated community, entry to which is governed by acceptance of terms, then in the real world you would struggle to convince anyone of the "social" prinicples behind such a place.
Social also, I believe, suggests to the users that they almost have a right to what they are using -- and this makes it difficult to "monetize", as our American cousins call it. Social responsibility, social housing and social business are all about providing to a community and not expecting much, if anything, back. Are social networks or social media different? Well, it makes it difficult to ask people to pay to be members for a start. And also, perhaps, to sell to them while they are enjoying your "social services".
"Social" places the wrong expectation on people as to how they should conduct themselves, because the reality is such services are provided by commercial organisations and are not gifts to enable you to enjoy an unregulated internet. You accept a set of terms when you sign up and if the party whose service you are using isn't policing you now, then they will be once they'be built their legal department, that will have things like regulation and reputation to worry about.
"Social" also makes it hard to take what you are doing and truly commercialise it, because the implication through the word is that it shouldn't have a cost attached.
We refer to WeCanDo.BIZ as a business network, because it better summarise the target market for our "social network". But also business people are used to paying for services they value. If we took money from our members to enable them to connect with new customers, we stay a network but I can't argue that we are then not very "social".
How long will it be before other Web 2.0 companies feel the pinch from investors and are forced to find a label that more accurately reflects their longer term intention too?
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
I have just had an interesting conversation with Matthew Brazil, MD of 6Consulting and an expert in social media monitoring, about some changes we've made to the WeCanDo.BIZ website this week. The changes were made necessary by a small number of users on our system incorrectly using (perhaps by choice) a feature we have that allows our members to "tweet" their most urgent business need, which we then send to matched businesses who may be able to help. We've now added a filter which means that the Biz Needs do not go out live, but are approved by our staff first before broadcast. Having read some let's say "inappropriate" Biz Needs coming through recently Matthew understood our motivation for doing it, but asked what people would think of us trying to police social media.
We had a long chat about this and my conclusion was that the use of the term "social" when applied to most Web 2.0 resources is incorrect. Not only is it suggesting the services provided are done so for the greater good, but it's also implying that many of the services are the stuff of community staple and should be as free as green spaces and fresh air. This is preventing more carefully management of such services that could easily be shown to provide value enough that people would pay.
Now I see Web 2.0 from the business angle, let me be clear. But even if you look at social networks and social media aimed at all and sundry, such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, there are commercial organisations behind these who are not providing those services out of altruism, but for a commercial gain (although most are yet to recognise how). With reputations to maintain, terms of use and legal responsibilities, are these places actually ever the place for free expression that everyone thinks?
This becomes truer still when you look at how other commercial organisations use such facilities to help promote their brand. Although they are buying into the community spirit, no one wants their brand ripped to pieces or associated with the sorts of comments you can see attached to YouTube videos or Facebook fan pages. It can only be a matter of time before the providers of such services start to take notice when those providing their revenue ask for the community to get cleaner. I can understand such a request entirely, but also recognise that if you police a gated community, entry to which is governed by acceptance of terms, then in the real world you would struggle to convince anyone of the "social" prinicples behind such a place.
Social also, I believe, suggests to the users that they almost have a right to what they are using -- and this makes it difficult to "monetize", as our American cousins call it. Social responsibility, social housing and social business are all about providing to a community and not expecting much, if anything, back. Are social networks or social media different? Well, it makes it difficult to ask people to pay to be members for a start. And also, perhaps, to sell to them while they are enjoying your "social services".
"Social" places the wrong expectation on people as to how they should conduct themselves, because the reality is such services are provided by commercial organisations and are not gifts to enable you to enjoy an unregulated internet. You accept a set of terms when you sign up and if the party whose service you are using isn't policing you now, then they will be once they'be built their legal department, that will have things like regulation and reputation to worry about.
"Social" also makes it hard to take what you are doing and truly commercialise it, because the implication through the word is that it shouldn't have a cost attached.
We refer to WeCanDo.BIZ as a business network, because it better summarise the target market for our "social network". But also business people are used to paying for services they value. If we took money from our members to enable them to connect with new customers, we stay a network but I can't argue that we are then not very "social".
How long will it be before other Web 2.0 companies feel the pinch from investors and are forced to find a label that more accurately reflects their longer term intention too?
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
Wednesday 3 September 2008, 3:34 PM
Google Chrome browser market share after Day 1 = 2.77%
Google's Chrome browser is now running on 2.77% of devices accessing the website, according to web stats company Clicky.
My thanks to SEO expert Nikki Pilkington for sharing with me (over Twitter, look her up) some stats Clicky has released of web traffic over the 45,00 unique websites it tracks since Google Chrome was released in beta at 7:00pm BST last night.
You can view the stats here: http://getclicky.com/chrome
They update every 15 mins, so you may see Chrome's marketshare climbing higher still.
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
My thanks to SEO expert Nikki Pilkington for sharing with me (over Twitter, look her up) some stats Clicky has released of web traffic over the 45,00 unique websites it tracks since Google Chrome was released in beta at 7:00pm BST last night.
You can view the stats here: http://getclicky.com/chrome
They update every 15 mins, so you may see Chrome's marketshare climbing higher still.
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
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