Modern Communication for Progressive Businesses
Motivation
Web 2.0 is becoming a reality for upstart business as well as established companies which would like to reach out to new customer groups. In our information society, coming up quickly with new services and information is vital. Former processes of designing, implementing, and deploying web-based applications are cumbersome, slow, and expensive. But why re-invent the wheel, when there are so many usable services readily availabe?
Opportunities
Never before was it that simple, quick, and affordable to come up with new services on the Internet. Best of all - the basics dont require more than registering with an email address and are free of service costs, up to some extent!
Do you want a web page setup? Choose, if it is to frequently publish news to the customers, then a blog is the "natural" choice. If you prefer to appear more static, a wiki seems better. Do you require strong community building? Probably a case for a social network. All options provide regular updates to frequent users, and can be used to collect feedback from customers. Additional services like mailing lists, polls/surveys, videos, even customer chat can be easily integrated, for, again, almost no costs, depending on the options.
The services are always available to you as content provider, independent which computer you use, or where you are. The only requirement is a working Internet connection and a browser, as all services are web-based. Some even offer interfaces specifically tailored to mobile devices. An increasing number of online services allow an offline mode for editing content while disconnected, and automatic re-syncing with the online content after the network becomes available again, so being disconnected isn't fatal for carrying on.
This offers unprecendeted collaboration opportunities. Gone are the times, where information and documents are sent around via email. Did you forget a co-worker in the address list? Too bad, someone else just edited the document, now, try re-integrating the changes of all participants! The modern way is to use an online page or word processor, which immediately shows changes to all online editors. Additional services like online chat side-by-side with the document are possible, easing collaboration even further. Due to the various collaboration features, transactions between co-workers, but also with customers are speed up significantly. Combination and re-integration of services into other services enables a rich and versatile usage experience.
These services don't require payment of any license costs, or require local updates, maintenance, rollouts, fade-outs, upgrades. It's on the web, you can just use it! Not only can you save maintenance costs, but also investments and deprecation costs: there is no need for any local server infrastructure, web servers and applications, backup systems, maintenance schedules, etc. This is all provided by web service hosters. The only thing required is a reliable and fast Internet connection, and local workstations able to connect to the Internet.
Changes
The "one application fits all requirements" approach of current IT solutions no longer apply. Outlook (or whichever tool is used for email, calendar, contacts, tasks, etc.) is no longer the one choice available. In fact, the concept of using a desktop application does no longer apply. In todays networked world, applications can be found within the network, available everywhere. This requires a well-established, performant, accessible, and reliable network infrastructure.
The flexibility of using several web-side applications at the same time for complementing workflows requires a high degree of flexibility and adaptability from the business users. The approach to have "one client application to access all information on a single server" is no longer valid. Business information is spread out across services, and various interfaces with different look-and-feel are required to use them.
Basically all web 2.0 services are presented in English. This is not necessarily a reduction in choice for the presented content, which can be in any language, though minor irriatations like unusable spell checking might result. Navigation and standard elements of the page though might still be in English and, depending on the chosen service, be immutable.
Changing the design of a web service is often a challenge and might collide with strict company policies. Usually, with increased service costs the configurability is increased as well, but will usually not be as good as a locally hosted application. On the positive side, changing the look within restricted bounds is much easier to perform for the casual application manager than full-fledged web design programming and can be done by anyone.
In addition, especially with free services, advertisements might get displayed on the content pages. The content of the ads can hardly be influenced, and might even contradict the conveyed message. This is a increasing side effect of todays ad-driven but low-cost services and are even present on content with wide and "neutral" content like newspaper sites.
As more service providers are used for presenting business information, the management of financial contracts with these providers is also increased, though usually easy enough to be included in the regular invoice workflows.
Hosting data critical to business success outside the own premises should be seen as a risk, as is the data communication going on upon using the online services. Hence, if the aspired business involves ideas of world-shaking impact or relevant to national security, hosting outside the own domain is not advised. Of course, additional measures to counter domestic and foreign national and military intelligence services must be taken then, too.
Summary
Combining Internet services offers many unprecedented opportunities to reach new customers for established businesses as well as providing quick and affordable options for start up ventures, allowing for quick and easy setup of services and allowing for a high degree of collaboration within and outside the company. Due to the multitude of available services, dynamicity of the environment, and particular set of requirements for your business, making an informed choice might be difficult. It's up to you to Make The Most Of It!
Make The Most Of It!
