Will 2009 be the turning point for Enterprise 2.0 initiatives? Well, OK, there are a bunch of other issues going on, like that whole financial crisis / collapse of the economy thing but still. I've been fairly bullish on E 2.0 projects and I do think that this year will be a turning point in many ways. E 2.0 projects just might be one of the things that thrive (or at least survive). Before we look at what companies might find compelling let's look at what the vendors are doing and how they seem to be approaching the development / rollout of these type of tools.
Basically two camps have emerged among the vendors that get E2.0 (or at least are starting to get it), those that are building (or buying) functionality in new and existing products from the ground up (Oracle's approach) and those companies that are partnering with consumer Web 2.0 vendors to create new offerings (the Salesforce.com / Facebook partnership, for example). It's to early to tell if one approach is better than the other and each does offer some interesting benefits. There's also no reason to think that vendors will stick with one approach over the other, it would be no surprise me to see some new imbedded functionality in a Salesforce.com release this year, for example. The acquisition route is also pretty interesting, especially in this economy where acquisition may well be the only way some of the Web / E 2.0 start ups survive. I've noted before that if customers find the offerings from the larger vendors like Oracle and Salesforce.com compelling, then I believe a lot of the E2.0 start ups are in trouble. Only time will tell but, with a few exceptions, that does seem to be the way this is playing out.
So why would companies be interested in investing in E2.0 in this economy? I mentioned in my Business Case 2.0 post that I think the idea of closer, more intimate relationships with both a companies customers and partners is now recognized as valuable and in a down economy, takes on more importance. That in itself is enough to drive companies to invest / shift money into E2.0 projects. There's also survey evidence that mid market companies are maintaining spend in social media type online marketing efforts which could also fuel E2.0 initiatives. The mid market in general has started to use technology as a significant competitive lever, especially in their efforts to compete effectively with larger enterprise companies in a global market. Social CRM, for example, will be viewed by many of these companies as a competitive advantage and, IMHO will get funded this year. I have said it a few times, and I do believe that E2.0 will be one of the bright spots over the next couple of years.
