BOOK NOW - OMTAC Ltd is offering new dates for this fast-track, intensive 4-day residential and non-residential Training Course for anyone wanting to get a solid grasp of the basic of Internet, Social Media and Mobile marketing and communications, see: www.digitalmarcoms.com.
10 / 05 / 10
MOBILE MARKETING (MOBILE APPS & MOBILE WEB)
OMTAC is delivering in-house training workshops to small, medium and large organisations on Mobile Marketing (Apps and Web). For information please email training@omtac.com.
22 / 02 / 10
NEW WORKSHOPS & SEMINARS 2010
New dates are now available for the 3 hour workshops and 1-day Seminars taking place around the UK in FACEBOOK & LINKEDIN, TWITTER, SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION (SEO), GOOGLE ADVERTISING and MOBILE MARKETING, see: www.omtac.com/go/workshopsbydate
02 / 10 / 09
ALUMNI & EDUCATION MARKETING ONLINE
Book now for these specialist 1-day seminars in 2010 for Alumni/Former Student communications and Student Recruitment & Admissions marketing for Schools, Colleges and Universities. For Education marketing see: www.omtac.com/go/emoseminar. For Alumni online see: www.omtac.com/go/alumniseminar.
01 / 07 / 09
MASTERCLASS WORKSHOPS
OMTAC Ltd has announced new dates for its Online Marketing Masterclass Workshop series, offering Masterclasses on Twitter, Facebook, SEO and Google marketing and advertising. Book now!
20 / 04 / 09
OMTAC WORKING WITH XING
OMTAC Ltd is working with professional network XING.com to help raise awareness of the network and supporting UK Higher Education students, staff and graduates (alumni) on the network.
03 / 02 / 09
NATIONAL CONFERENCE
Despite the heavy snowfall many delegates still managed to attend the ALUMNI ONLINE 09 Conference in London organised by OMTAC Ltd and it proved a very productive, successful day.
"WEB 2.0" is the buzz phrase for the collection of technologies that enable people to communicate and easily share ideas and information directly. Wikipedia provides a helpful explanation of the origin of the phrase:
"'Web 2.0' is a phrase coined by O'Reilly Media in 2003 and popularised by the first Web 2.0 conference in 2004, refers to a perceived second generation of web-based communities and hosted services — such as social-networking sites, wikis and folksonomies — which facilitate collaboration and sharing between users. O'Reilly Media titled a series of conferences around the phrase, and it has since become widely adopted."
"Although the term suggests a new version of the World Wide Web, it does not refer to an update to Web technical specifications, but to changes in the ways systems developers have used the web platform. Some technology experts, notably Tim Berners-Lee, have questioned whether one can use the term in a meaningful way, since many of the technology components of 'Web 2.0' have existed since the beginnings of the internet."
Also for the record, the phrase "Web 2.0" has been used as a synonym for "Semantic Web", described in Wikipedia as "an evolving extension of the World Wide Web in which web content can be expressed not only in natural language, but also in a form that can be read and used by software agents, thus permitting them to find, share and integrate information more easily; it derives from Tim Berners-Lee's vision of the Web as a universal medium for data, information, and knowledge exchange."
Click on "Play" below to watch a video introduction to Web 2.0 posted on YouTube by Jeff Utecht from Shanghai, China:
Or to put it another way... watch "Web 2.0... The Machine is Us/ing Us", a very creative response to Utecht's video that was later posted on YouTube by Michael Wesch, Assistant Professior of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University, receiving over 2,800,000 viewings:
Wikipedia again: "As used by its supporters, the phrase "Web 2.0" can (also) refer to one or more of the following:
the transition of web sites from isolated information silos to sources of content and functionality, thus becoming computing platforms serving web applications to end-users;
a social phenomenon embracing an approach to generating and distributing Web content itself, characterized by open communication, decentralization of authority, freedom to share and re-use, and "the market as a conversation";
enhanced organization and categorization of content, emphasizing deep linking;
a rise in the economic value of the Web, possibly surpassing the impact of the dot-com boom of the late 1990s."
Most people will therefore be familiar with the principles of Web 2.0 from their own experience of one or more of these technologies and channels, though it is true that these are more likely to be familiar to younger internet users than older business executives. Web 2.0 therefore represents a great challenge to businesses and organisations and the managers who run them, forcing a rethink of the traditional forms of customer interaction and hierarchies of working.
Businesses and organisations that ignore Web 2.0 do so at their peril. Web 2.0 is about competitive advantage, not only in terms of Internet Marketing and Ecommerce (selling and transacting online) but also in terms of how such companies are managed and do business internally and externally with suppliers, customers and clients. Management structures are flattened, management may no longer hold all the power as "knowledge brokers", customers have a public voice and can have a disproportionate effect on brand image depending on their positive or negatives experiences.
Used in the context of business the Web 2.0 tools are also being referred to as "Enterprise 2.0" and are being embraced by an encouraging number of business executives according to a McKinsey survey of 2,800 executives on Web 2.0 in January 2007. More than half of those surveyed were happy with investments in technologies and 75% planned to maintain or increase investments in coming years. Technology companies are the early adopters as might be expected but 77% of retailers say they will also be doing so, as well as 63% of financial services executives.
Overall McKinsey found strong interest in many Web 2.0 technologies but much less widespread adoption. Of the tools it looked at it found that social networking was the most popular tool, with 19% of companies having invested in it, followed by podcasts (17%), blogs (16%), RSS (14%), wikis (13%), and mashups (4%). When you add in companies planning to invest in the tools, the percentages are: social networking (37%), RSS (35%), podcasts (35%), wikis (33%), blogs (32%), and mashups (21%).
Leading the way are Indian firms, 80% of which plan to increase their investments in Web 2.0 over the next three years, compared with 69% of Asia-Pacific firms, 65% of European firms, 64% of Chinese firms, 64% of North American firms, and 62% of Latin American firms.
Web 2.0 can bring ready and relatively inexpensive access to current and prospective customers. The Internet is a global open forum for the exchange of "good, bad and ugly" dialogue about a brand, product or service, whether a business or organisation likes it or not. Even School pupils can now rate their teachers or post video of their teachers online. Managers must therefore become familiar with Web 2.0 (or Enterprise 2.0) technologies and get involved to exploit these new channels positively while proactively managing negative issues as and when they arise.
Good customer service, effective engagement with clients, positive feedback about products and services, easy transaction, ordering, booking... all these can add up to a very powerful use of these technologies on a business or organisation, leading to rapid growth locally, nationally and internationally.
Internally these technologies can lead to dramatic improvements in knowledge exchange, sharing and management within companies, to new idea generation and accelerated product and service development, to cost savings and better investment. Blogs, wikis and chatrooms can serve as the foundations for a new corporate culture in which all employees can play a full role.
[This section is currently being updated - please check back soon.]
"'Web 2.0' is a phrase coined by 
Most people will therefore be familiar with the principles of Web 2.0 from their own experience of one or more of these technologies and channels, though it is true that these are more likely to be familiar to younger internet users than older business executives. Web 2.0 therefore represents a great challenge to businesses and organisations and the managers who run them, forcing a rethink of the traditional forms of customer interaction and hierarchies of working.
Overall McKinsey found strong interest in many Web 2.0 technologies but much less widespread adoption. Of the tools it looked at it found that social networking was the most popular tool, with 19% of companies having invested in it, followed by podcasts (17%), blogs (16%), RSS (14%), wikis (13%), and mashups (4%). When you add in companies planning to invest in the tools, the percentages are: social networking (37%), RSS (35%), podcasts (35%), wikis (33%), blogs (32%), and mashups (21%).
Web 2.0 can bring ready and relatively inexpensive access to current and prospective customers. The Internet is a global open forum for the exchange of "good, bad and ugly" dialogue about a brand, product or service, whether a business or organisation likes it or not. Even School pupils can now