Thursday, September 25, 2008

Web 3.0 your CONSUMER will design your product!

In earlier posts I commented on my vision for what Web 2.0 is, and what Web 3.0 will be. While I stand by those comments, they were more from an infrastructure standpoint. I want us to now think about the same question - how it relates to, and what it means to marketing your brand.

If ever there was a definition of Web 1.0, it was "advertising". At the advent of the Internet, most brands simply did what they had always been doing offline. Static one way communication, as dictated from marketing, or some advertising agency.

With Web 2.0 it gets interesting, and more importantly interactive. Now I hate using other's cliches, and I am certainly not the first to state this; Web 2.0 is about interacting, or as Chris Brogan often uses the term - *listening*.

Since most of us are clear about what Web 1 & 2.0 are, lets look for a moment about what Web 3.0 might be (recall this is all as it pertains to marketing a brand - a subject that came up during an excellent Chat hosted by @lindydreyer).

In my vision of Web 3.0 a brand will not put their product out there to discuss (they will, but that will be "So Web 2.0"). The consumer will instead tell the brand what to produce. One of the upcoming trends of Web 3.0 (IMO) is Crowd Sourcing. If you do not know about it, you should. In the future, people will apply their needs, and demands collectively. The sheer power of




these groups will shape everything from what you will be able to charge for your product, to what that product is. Think I'm crazy, then you need to visit Fusion Center. Fusion Center, is a business that was built entirely by a crowd of people who shared a passion for a product that did not exist. The resulting business has produced over 26 products - ALL thought up by the crowd. Not one product that they produced was based on an internal (to the company) thought . The resulting products are exactly what their consumer wants, and priced more efficiently then any products that have since entered their space.

What is your vision for marketing in a Web 3.0 world?

PLEASE COMMENT and tell me YOUR vision, or if you liked this Share It. Want to comment in private, send me a Tweet.

3 comments:

Lindy Dreyer said...

Crowdsourcing is a cool phenomenon. A variation on that is what Google is doing with there Project 10 to the 100th. Do you think this is a 3.0 initiative? The tools are blunt...it's what they're doing with them that's more interesting.

http://www.project10tothe100.com/i

Faith Renee Sloan said...

StyleHop is doing this for the consumer fashion world. They're in private alpha and I was invited to check it out. Great idea!

Gotta love crowdsourcing. For the people -- by the people...

Change The World
God Bless
Faith

Alex said...

I think the underlying philosophy here is correct. That said, i think it's less the Fusion model (although no doubt companies like threadless and fusion are doing well with this model) and more about tapping into the collective opinions and feedback of the consumer to better drive brand experience.

From a consumer standpoint, i think it's about creating a web that is personally relevant. IMHO we have reached a point of too much information from too many "friends" and sources. Now i think (and hope for my start-up's sake) that we will be moving towards a less is more model whereas we will leverage our social connections (both real and virtual) to help filter and deliver us the content, brands and opinions we care about.

So yeah, i definitely think 3.0 means more collective voices driving change.

feel free to check out my blog here to gain more insight on my thoughts and ideas as we move forward. You can also find some posts on Urban Revurb--the consumer based start-up i am in the process of launching.

Cheers,
-A