Web 2.0 tools help CPAs
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Blogs, microblogs, podcasts, wikis, virtual worlds, social networks … and what they mean for your business
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Web 2.0 tools help CPAs
- 1. Web 2.0: Less hype, more help Blogs, microblogs, podcasts, wikis, virtual worlds, social networks … and what they mean for your business Bill Sheridan E-Communications Manager / Editor Maryland Association of CPAs
- 2. Why are we talking about this stuff? Video: “Social Media Revolution,” from Erik Qualman / Socialnomics
- 3. 4x = 1890 7X = 1670 7x = 1670
- 12. Who’s doing it right?
- 13. Who’s doing it right?
- 14. Who’s doing it right? The bottom line: Blogging is becoming an accepted -- and expected -- corporate communication tool.
- 16. Keys to blogging success Content … … and commitment
- 19. Microblogging
- 25. Second Life / Virtual worlds
- 26. Second Life / Virtual worlds 80 percent of active Internet users will have a virtual world presence by 2011. - Gartner Group
- 30. The experience of virtual worlds “ In the future, as the technology continues to improve, I expect to see virtual worlds become immersive experiences that are difficult to differentiate from the real world.” -- John Zdanowski, CFO, Linden Lab
- 31. Which leads us where? Video: “Did You Know 3.0,” from Karl Fisch, and modified by Scott McLeod
- 33. Questions?
Editor's Notes
- Hi, everyone. Thanks for joining me today for “Web 2.0: Less hype, more help.” I’m Bill Sheridan. I’m the e-communications manager and editor for the Maryland Association, and for a while now, part of my job has been to try to figure out how social media tools might be used to benefit our members and clients. We’ve learned a few things over the past couple of years or so, and I thought I’d share them with you today. So let ‘s get started. So why are we here? Hopefully, you signed up to learn a little bit more about Web 2.0 and what it can do for our members. -- In general, social media allow for two-way communication between yourself and your audiences – in our case, our members . -- They build community. You’re going to be hearing the word “community” a lot today. That’s really the key to social media tools. They build communities of like-minded people who want to communicate, network, share resources, ask questions, get advice, have fun with people that they have a lot in common with. That’s really what social media is all about. -- They encourage your audiences to participate and collaborate with you. They can even create new content for you. -- That’s really the key word – “collaboration.” A lot of businesses are finding it’s no longer enough to speak TO people. You have to speak WITH them, have a conversation with them. More and more businesses are finding advantages to opening up the process and their communication and turning it into a two-way street. And social media can help do that.
- Now that was a very broad definition of Web 2.0. But let’s take a few moments to define our terms a little more specifically. Some of you may have seen this already … because it’s been viewed, oh, I don’t know, about 3 million times on YouTube already. But I love this video and I’m gonna show it to you anyway. It was created by Michael Wesch, an Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University , and I think it kind of captures the reason we’re here today. So indulge me for a few minutes and check this out. Now, some of the text in this video is a little small and might be hard to read. I believe you have an option to enlarge the video player on your screen. You might want to go ahead and do that. So let’s take a look. It ends on kind of a philosophical note, and we’re not going to dive too deep into the philosophy or the moral dilemmas presented by Web 2.0. Rather, I want to focus on the tools that are creating all the fuss – and let you decide whether these tools might be worth exploring yourself. So let’s get started with …
- How fast is it changing? This will give you some idea. This is an estimate from an Educational Panel at the 2007 Aspen Institute. As it relates to science and technology, the rate of change in the next decade is likely to be 4 to 7 times faster than in the previous decade. If it is 4 times faster, it would be like planning for today in 1890. If it is 7 times faster, it would be like planning for today in 1670. So now is the time to start figuring this stuff out.
- And talk about the rate of change: Twitter had about 8 million unique visitors in February. By April, that number was up to 17 million. Now, it’s somewhere north of 32 million, nearly all of them marketers or “social media experts,” judging from their bios. But an impressive number of CPAs as well. Facebook has 250 million active users, making it, in terms of population, the fourth largest nation on earth. It added 50 million users in the past three months. At that pace, the population of Facebook will surpass that of the United States in October. LinkedIn is still growing quickly. Ning, Plaxo, MySpace – they’re all trending upward. And all these people? Our members are some of them. Why would any business or association or non-profit consider using social media? There’s the answer -- our members are using it. If we don’t keep up, they’re going to figure out ways to collaborate and connect without us. And where will we be then?
- Some more numbers here to back up that theory.
- Let’s talk about our future members, our future employees, our future clients for a minute. Here are some stats from Pew Internet and the American Life project about how our future members are using social media. What’s funny is that if you ask these kids how good they are with technology, they'll rate themselves as very low – not very good at all. With them, it’s not about the technology. There’s an old saying: Once technology becomes ubiquitous, it also becomes invisible. And that’s what’s happened here.
- And how about CPAs and finance executives? Well, Rick Telberg recently conducted a nationwide survey to find out what CPAs are doing online. That’s Rick there during his appearance at the Maryland Business and Accounting Expo, where he presented the results of the survey. He had almost 700 responses. 59 percent of them were in public practice, 23 percent were in business and industry. And here’s what he found: 54 percent of CPAs are on LinkedIn 48 percent are on Facebook 21 percent are on Twitter 61 percent attend webinars 28 percent listen to podcasts 36 percent read blogs. Interestingly, 11 percent write for a blog, either their own or their company’s, and 14 percent leave comments on other people’s blogs. Now, a word of warning. This survey was conducted online by a promoted heavily on Telberg’s blog, so you could argue that the respondents were inherently more likely to be doing this stuff. Still, the message is clear: Our members are out there. They’re using this stuff, and in increasing numbers
- Let’s start with a question: For those of you who work for a company that is exploring social media, why is your company doing so? What are the benefits? Improved communication, perhaps. Publicity. Community-building. Building your brand. For those of you who aren’t using social media?, why not? Might it have something to do with this? I’ve talked to a lot of people in the association world, anyway, whose organizations are downright afraid of this stuff. And, no matter what you think about Web 2.0, I’m here to tell you that fear should NEVER drive your decisions on whether to do this or not. Social media are lot of things, but they’re not something you should be afraid of.
- So, let’s start defining our terms. First of all, what is a blog? “Blog” is short for “Web log.” They are Web sites of news and commentary that allow readers to give feedback about what they are reading. So many people still consider blogs a new technology. But believe it or not, blogs have been around for nearly 12 years. They are an accepted form of communication – and more and more often, they are an expected form of communication. Ignore them at your own peril, because they are here to stay.
- A main reason is communication. -- A blog can be valuable addition to your communication strategy. How? Well … -- It provides real-time communication with your audiences – and that includes not only current and potential customers, but their clients, investors, and don’t forget employees. A lot of blogs are being used very effectively as internal communications tools. -- Great way to quickly publish company news in real time, and to get that news out to the world quickly. Blogs are known as search engine darlings. Search results are dominated by blogs. It’s amazing the kind of traffic you can push to your site through search engines. And because of that, you can bypass normal channels to get the word out. You no longer have to write a press release and hope the media run it. You can publish it yourself. -- Blogs can be great marketing tools … as long as the content is not blatant marketing. Blog readers are a finicky bunch and, as a rule, they don’t like to read sales pitches. Next is the notion of control. -- Right now, you have none. People are talking about your company RIGHT NOW, and you don't even know it. But with blogs, and specifically with the “Comments” feature, you can join the conversation and get your messaging out. It gives you an element of control over the conversation that you didn’t have before. -- Ability to quickly address positive and negative feedback. -- Market research: Gather feedback from customers, other key constituencies. Posting questions to your blog and gauging reactions by seeing how your readers are answering those questions. And it doesn’t cost anything. Market research is notoriously expensive, so this might be a way to get actionable results at a fraction of the cost. And last but not least, exposure. It's a great way to position your company's thought leadership. We’re all experts at something. We can use blogs to create niche content that promotes our expertise … and, at the same time, our businesses. Informative, thought-provoking blog posts about issues that your audiences care about tend to spread quickly throughout the blogosphere. And, because of the great search engine results blogs receive, you will drive traffic to your company. It’s like do-it-yourself public relations, and it works.
- Establish your company as a thought leader. We’re all experts in something. Blogs give you the opportunity to share that expertise with large audiences – and communicate directly with that audience. Reinvent your marketing strategy. With blogs, you can: -- Bypass the media and take your message directly to the public -- and get feedback in the process. -- turn your blog into an add-on to your PR strategy and make your blog work in conjunction with your public relations. -- Use them as a form of viral marketing. Build communities and improve customer relations. The readerships of successful corporate blogs include engaged customers or potential customers who are passionate about your company and its products and services. Blogs often turn readers in champions for your company – especially if you’re giving them content that they care about and that they can’t get anywhere else. Enhance legislative advocacy, especially among non-profits. Example: The MACPA – www.CPAlegislativeinsider.com. Lots of other associations are doing similar things as well. Expand your brand. If people like your blog, they’re going to tell others about it. More people are going to know your and what you do.
- Who’s doing it right? Let’s start with Fortune 500 companies. As of July 29, 77 of them – or more than 15 percent of them – are blogging today, and the number is growing. And in the interest of complete disclosure, a quick glance at this slide might be a bit deceiving. That logo down in the lower right hand corner? That’s the Business Learning Institute, and we are NOT a Fortune 500 company … yet. That’s just where our logo resides on our PowerPoint templates. And it’s not just the big companies, either …
- Plenty of companies outside of huge corporate America are blogging as well. Here are just a few.
- And then you’ve got the CEOs. A number of CEOs and other business executives are finding the time to churn out some thought-provoking – and very popular – blogs these days. The idea here is that these blogs put a personal face on a business, and often they feature some opinionated commentary that you might not find in your typical company blog. -- There’s Bob Langert, VP of corporate responsibility for McDonald’s. -- There’s David Sifry, founder and CEO of Technorati. -- There’s Jonathan Schwartz, president and CEO of Sun Microsystems. -- And there, of course, is Marc Cuban, billionaire entrepreneur and owner of the Dallas Mavericks professional basketball team. And most recently, the focus of an SEC insider-trading investigation. And if you’re into that type of thing, Cuban has turned his blog, blogmaverick.com, into a rant against the SEC, at least in part. That’s been kind of entertaining to follow and will likely remain so for the time being. So I’m going to keep reading, because he’s never shy about telling us what he thinks. Among many, many others.
- Now, I’m a huge fan of blogs. I get probably an easy majority of my news from blogs these days. And, given the opportunity, I’ll try to convince anyone that they should at least consider starting a blog and seeing where it can take them. However, there are some reasons why you might NOT want to blog. To start with, it's hard work. Anyone can create a blog. Maintaining it and making it succeed takes talent, time and commitment. You're opening yourself up to the world. Back to that issue of control. Some people love publicity, others shy away from it. If you’re one of the latter, blogs might not be for you. If you're not willing to do these things, you don't want to blog. Seth Godin – I mentioned him earlier on the slide about small-business bloggers. He’s a thought leader in the areas of business marketing, strategy, social media and pretty much everything else. Great blog, by the way. You’ll find it at SethGodin.typepad.com. He says: "I don't want to use a tool unless I'm going to use it really well. Doing any of these things halfway is worse than not at all."
- Keys to blogging success. Content. It starts and ends here. If you don’t write something worth reading, nothing else matters. Commitment. Creating a blog is easy … it literally takes about 5 minutes. The hard part is maintaining it and making it succeed. Technorati estimates there are nearly 113 million blogs in existence today. That sounds impressive, but what it really means – to me, anyway – is that there’s a lot of garbage out there in the blogosphere. The great blogs are rare, because they take a lot of hard work. But the payoffs can be substantial.
- And even if you decide blogging isn’t for you, even if you don’t write a blog, READ THEM! If you’re not reading blogs, boy, you can’t IMAGINE the information you’re missing. There is so much good stuff out there on almost ANY subject – including the ones that apply directly to your business. And there are some great tools out there to make reading blogs ridiculously easy. Most blogs offer an option in which you can subscribe merely by entering your e-mail address. Then, new posts are delivered straight to your inbox. You also can subscribe via RSS, which is a way to pull content from all of your favorite Web sites into one centralized location so you don’t have to go surfing all over the Web to find what you want. So for instance, you would click on the orange RSS symbol to get a blog’s RSS feed, then add that feed to your favorite RSS reader (like Google Reader or My Yahoo or Bloglines). That will bring all new blog posts directly to your RSS reader. Some blogs offer “widgets” that you can use to place that blog’s posts directly on your own Web site, so you can offer that blog’s content to your Web site readers. This is an example; it’s one of the Baltimore Sun blogs. The point is, folks, there’s a ton of great stuff out there in the blogosphere, and I think you owe it to yourself to at least check it out. So that’s a look at blogging. Now we’re going to take a look at blogging’s baby brother …
- Microblogging -- Blogging in miniature. -- Twitter is the most popular example: Posts are limited to 140 or fewer characters. -- You “follow” the updates of only the people you choose. So you don’t have to read what everyone is writing. When you’re logged in, you’ll see only the updates of the people who are important to you. -- You can receive updates online, on your smart phones as text messages, and even feed them into your Web site or blog. -- Great for quick-hitting, real-time alerts and announcements. -- And a lot of it is being done via mobile devices. Examples: A lot of news organizations are posting breaking news on Twitter before that news is available anywhere else. The terrorist attacks Mumbai last year. There were people there, on the ground in India, posting updates and photos via Twitter. And this was information that wasn’t available anywhere else. I tell you, the most fun I’ve had with social media came on Election Day, and following what people were saying about the election, the voting process, the results. The news organizations were posting excerpts from candidates’ speeches on Twitter almost in real time. It’s really becoming a very powerful tool. Any type of breaking news event, you’re likely to read about it first on Twitter, because the people on the scene become the reporters.
- How might businesses use it? Internally, by posting updates that are important to your staff or team. Conferences is a great example. It’s a great communications tool. By posting important corporate news and updates that your followers would be interested in. Marketers are absolutely in LOVE with Twitter. By getting feedback or asking questions. Twitter is great for getting opinions. By listening to what people are saying about you, and responding. Networking, networking, networking. And there are some great third-party applications that really bring Twitter to life by helping you search for topics or people, post photos, post and answer messages from your desktop, and more. These applications really give Twitter its power. Twitter promotes itself with the tagline, “What are you doing?” But when you use Twitter for business, it might be better to tell people what you’re thinking. Look for like-minded business folks and network with them. Ask questions, share resources and have fun! I think you’ll find it’s a very powerful and addictive tool. And best of all, it’s free. For now.
- Podcasts -- Audio / video files delivered straight to your computer via RSS feeds. -- Great communication add-on. -- Cheap and easy to create, but like blogs, they require time, talent and dedication.
- Wikis -- Web pages that anyone can edit. -- Most popular example: Wikipedia. -- Possible business uses: Internal communications and project management. A central online location where employees can not only read information, but contribute to it. -- The MACPA recently created a wiki that is being used by our Customized Learning department, and eventually we hope the entire staff will be using it to manage internal projects. -- The “Help” section of the MACPA’s content management system is a wiki. -- Wanna play around? Check out Wikispaces or PBWiki.
- Next up, we have social networks. These are nothing more than online communities of like-minded people. Facebook and MySpace are the most well-known examples, but there are some professional networking sites out there to help people build their on-the-job networks as well. I particularly like LinkedIn. It’s like Facebook for working adults. You can upload job histories, share professional recommendations, join job-related “groups” in which you can network, ask and answer questions, share resources and more. And don’t underestimate their power. According to some estimates, Facebook has around 250 million users, MySpace has about 200 million users, LinkedIn has around 40 million users and Plaxo has between 20 and 30 million users. The MACPA has created groups on each of these networks and we’re trying to figure out how to best use them to our members’ benefit. If you want to join in, I’ll give you some links at the end of the presentation where you can find more information.
- You can build social networks and communities around almost anything. 1. Flickr is a photo-sharing site. You can share your photos with friends, family and photographers with similar tastes. You can comment on photos, tag them to help organize them, and turn them into cool stuff like calendars, business cards, coffee mugs … whatever. And Flickr’s not the only one out there. Others include Zoomr, Fotki, PhotoBucket and SmugMug. 2. We’ve all probably heard of YouTube by now. It’s a hugely popular video-sharing site. Users can upload their own videos, share them with friends, post comments and ratings, download and embed videos in their Web sites and blogs. And then you have what San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has done. Have you heard about this? Mayor Newsom has created what he calls an “interactive state of the city.” Most state-of-the-city addresses are about an hour long or less and touch briefly on a bunch of different topics. Well, Mayor Newsom decided he wasn’t going to have limits like that put on his address. So he has created 10 YouTube videos, each of which focuses on a different area – health care, education, the environment, etc. All together, the videos total 7 and a half hours, and viewers can choose to watch a little or a lot. No one’s gonna edit this guy – not when he has the power of Web 2.0 at his fingertips. He has something to say and he’s gonna say it all. The only thing I don’t like is that it appears he is not letting viewers comment on the videos, which kind of defeats the purpose, if you ask me. But he’s thinking, and that’s cool. 3. You can even build communities around PowerPoint presentations and other slideshows – share them, comment and rate them, network with people with similar interests.
- Which brings us to Second Life and virtual worlds. If you’re not familiar with the concept, virtual worlds allow you to create a virtual version of yourself, called an “avatar,” and interact with people from all over the world. In Second Life, the users create all of the content you see – buildings, clothing, landscape, products. Second Life has its own currency, called the Linden dollar, and users can buy and sell virtual products and trade Lindens on the Lindex, Second Life’s virtual exchange. It’s a virtual economy, but people are making real money there. Virtual worlds are no game. And if you’re looking for a reason why you should take it seriously, consider this:
- Those are your customers, clients, members and employees we’re talking about.
- Who’s there, beside a LOT of weirdos? Well, there are a bunch of reputable businesses there. Here are just a handful. And what are some of the possible business applications? -- Simulations of RL products and services. Starwood Hotels and its Aloft Hotel. -- Networking and community, especially for membership organizations and internal applications. -- Entertainment -- Brand expansion -- Education, education, education
- Here’s one more view of the future of virtual business.
- I have a colleague who offered very similar views recently. Chris Jenkins from the Ohio Society of CPAs. Now, in interest of full disclosure, Chris is not a big fan of Second Life. But he does see it as a step toward the virtualization of the Web. Here’s how he sees the Web evolving: 1. Web 1.0: Static information. We post it, you read it. QED. 2. Web 2.0: The social Web. Interaction, communities, Web users creating the content. 3. Web 3.0: The semantic Web, where all information has meaning. If Web 2.0 connects people to people, Web 3.0 connects people to everything. 4. Web 4.0: From Chris Jenkins: "The virtual Web, where your everyday life is mimicked in a virtual world. As you travel, your avatar will follow like a shadow in the virtual world. It becomes possible to do electronic social networking as you walk down the street. When you enter a store or restaurant, you can be connected to others with like interest. You will be virtually introduced. If you are low on milk and pass a grocery store, your device will alert you to stop on your way home. This is why Second Life is a great beta but not the end solution. Hardware and bandwidth must create a lifelike experience that will allow for alternate input and a more robust communication platform. Once the hardware catches up, the mainstream will follow.“ And the hardware will catch up. Which leads us back to Gartner’s prediction. John Z. also looks at Second Life as today’s e-mail. In 1992, no one had an e-mail address. Now everyone does.
- So what do we make of all this? Yeah, it’s all pretty cool. But is it worth the effort? My short answer is, “Without question.” And why? Well, we’re not getting any younger, folks. And the people who will take our places in the workforce? They’re being raised on this stuff. They’ve never known a world without it. What we’re doing now is an investment in our future. If we don’t figure this stuff out, the next generation will turn to those who have figured it out, and we will have lost any chance we ever had of getting them. I’m going to close with an 8-minute video. You might have already seen this. It only has, oh, 2.5 million or so views on YouTube. And yeah, it’s about a year old at this point, so some of its stats are a little out of date. But it’s message is pretty powerful. It speaks directly to the reason we’re spending so much time on Web 2.0 technologies – and why it’s vitally important that we stay ahead of the curve going forward. Our future depends on it. And if you think that’s a bit over-melodramatic, well, take a look at this.
- And three final points from Jeff De Cagna, founder of Principled Innovation and one of the most forward thinkers in this space that I know.