Few companies lead. Most follow when it comes to Web 2.0

This morning I read this survey on ‘Trends and Best Practices in Adopting Web 2.0 in 2008’ made by Awareness, a US based research company. The report explores the adoption of Web 2.0 technologies and the future of social media initiatives for Enterprises in 2008.
Of course it contains a bunch of interesting stuff (read more about that on RWW where I found it) but I’ll focus on one thing that I think is typical for companies today.
In the report I read that blogs are on top of the list when companies tell us what external-facing Web 2.0 technologies they plan to implement in 2008. Photo sharing, wikis and podcasts get the bottom score.
When it comes to Web 2.0 and social media, to me this is typical. Most companies today doesn’t have a digital strategy that is truly based on their business idea and plan. Instead they go with the flow. Your ordinary trade magazine lands in your mailbox. It reads BLOGS on the cover. You run! BLOGS, we gotta have blogs.
Now, you might say. Hell, you’re using a blog to promote yourself! -Yes I am. I’m not saying Blogs shouldn’t be in the survey, of course they should. But, most companies would do better to implement social sharing, user drive support sections, pressrooms with RSS feeds, photo sharing, twitter news feeds, video streams, podcasts etc. Blogs should be somewhere in the bottom. In order to keep a Blog interesting you have to do as I and a lot of other bloggers do, post something each day. Preferable something unique that ads value. Once you stop for a few days, your followers loose interest. Most organizations that I’ve met professionally aren’t ready for this kind of commitment. On top of that few has something valuable to write about every day. With the budgets they have a well produced monthly podcast would be far more valuable.
Get me right. I’m not criticizing the fact that companies bet money on Blogs. I merely think most companies hasn’t gotten a digital strategy in place but instead follow other companies. When it comes to marketing and communication you should be very clear on what different commitments lead to.
Last but not least. If a company would really understand the value of social media, put an effort behind the right things AND treat their communication budgets one instead of allocating 90% to offline media without blinking. Then we would really se some changes!
If you missed the linked to the survey. Here it is.