Thursday, September 18, 2008

Social Media - Yet another Delivery Channel?

While we talk about Multi-channel / Pervasive applications, have we ever thought of Social Media websites as one of the delivery channels?. And thats the news today...Gone are the days where the customers will reach out to company's website to access their applications.
The trend today is that...Apps are reaching out to customers where they are...
I was thrilled to see this - Online Banking Module for Facebook called MyMoney. This module offers transactional online banking services to Facebook users such as view account balances, review account history and transfer funds right within the Facebook itself.
What this means is that Facebook / Social Media websites are slowly emerging as Enterprise Application Delivery platforms where company's can unleash a whole new set of services targeted at Generation Y. And the added bonus is the viral marketing where the existing connections among members can be easily leveraged for marketing new products/services. The possibilities are immense.
And it looks like Top banks have realised the potential as well. Its impressive to see what Wells Forgo is doing in web 2.0 / Social Media space. And as of yesterday, Wachovia Bank has ventured into using Twitter to reach out to customers.
And Apple iPhone Store has quite a few serious apps including Financial services.
This proliferation of apps trend in web 2.0 can be taken for granted by the Gen Y customers and companies may need to seriously evaluate the options for venturing into web 2.0 / Social Media. Today, if a company does not have an online presence / very good online presence, its brand value may be affected which may eventually lead to reduced sales / customers. Similarly, in future, the company's may be forced to have a presence in the Social media sites as well..

No comments: