Web 2.0 for the Channel Elay Cohen, Salesforce.com
2. Applying Web 2.0 to the Channel The following are five key best practice and tools vendors can incorporate into their overall channel strategy to bring Web 2.0 to the channel – today. 1) Content Syndication and Subscriptions The problem is information and content – such as sales tools, training guides, program guides, competitive briefs, product specifications, PowerPoint presentations, pricing guides and price lists – is unstructured. Research by Merrill Lynch and IDC has shown 85 per cent of business information found on the internet is unstructured. It is accepted that information is unlabelled and difficult to find, resulting in a frustrating experience for partners. According to Forrester Research, only 44 per cent of business users can find what they are looking for on their corporate intranet and yet 87 per cent of people can find what they are looking for on the internet. Vendors need to develop systems and processes that leverage lessons learned from the consumer world so partners can find relevant information. If partners can’t find information they are looking for, they are unable to sell products correctly. Content dissemination and intelligent content publishing should be smart and easy to use for the partners, which in turn will drive increased loyalty to unprecedented levels. Here are some questions to ask about the company’s content repository: • • • • •
Is it as easy to use as Google? Can information be found as quickly on partner portals as on Amazon? Is the content leveraging tagging? Can partners give feedback on content? Is it known which content partners find most useful?
An intelligent content publishing system must include the ability to tag content – where multiple tags can be added to an individual document. This means partners can find information using terms applicable to them, not to the vendor. It also means partners don’t need to know exactly where content is located - they don’t need to worry about navigating a folder hierarchy - they just need to know what terms describe the type of content they need. For example, let’s say a vendor has uploaded a training guide that is also a competitive training tool and an RFP tool. Let’s also say this document is for the insurance industry sector. On a traditional portal, the partner would need to figure out if this document is under the RFP section of the portal, the competitive analysis section of the portal, the industry verticals section of the portal, etc. With a Web 2.0 based content system, the document would be tagged with all these relevant attributes - the location doesn’t matter. So when a partner comes to the portal looking for a competitive sales tool for the insurance industry, they search for appropriate tags and the most relevant information is shown. © Baptie and Company 2008
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