Oracle: Web 2.0 an 'imperative' for business

With the business world becoming more competitive, it is critical that organisations have a Web 2.0 strategy to communicate their message to employees and customers, an industry player has said.

Web 2.0 tools, encompassing second-generation web applications, such as social-networking sites and blogs, aim to facilitate information-sharing and collaboration among users.

Bill Kearney, general manager of enterprise content management at Oracle Asia-Pacific, noted Web 2.0's commercial appeal: "It's fun and entertaining, which is great for advertisers to try and target a particular audience."

Web 2.0 and web content management facilitate collaborative communication, Kearney said in an interview. "The industry is looking at deploying Web 2.0 to empower the user community, to create a collaborative workspace where people who are not experts at using technology can very easily go online and start to work together," he said.

"If anything, it's almost an imperative for many organisations because this world has become more competitive," Kearney noted.

Kearney added that businesses that use their corporate sites to sell to customers can also gain from deploying Web 2.0 tools.

To drive more traffic to their corporate sites, vendors can create forums for online users to chat or blog about a product, or provide an editorial space for people to discuss topical subjects on the web. This could then generate product sales for the company, said Kearney.

He added that implementing a web content management program can help businesses simplify processes and tasks needed to publish web content. The key, Kearney said, is to have a mechanism in place that makes it easy for users to enter information into the system.

"The scenario where you have to go back to the webmaster [each time you need] to get anything [added or changed] on the site creates a barrier [for users]," Kearney said.