Web3.0

If you thought StarWars was big in 1977, you’d better hold onto your hat because Web3.0 is here and it’s going to take you on a ride that will change the face of business and consumerism forever.

I’m guessing many of you haven’t heard of Web3.0? Don’t be alarmed because most people haven’t. Like most ages of technology (or any historic time really), it’s name is usually not derived till well after the fact. The “.com” era or Web2.0 were well upon us before anyone was really using those terms in everyday conversation.

So what is Web3.0 and why the hell is it important?

Well it’s important on a number of levels. In the past, the power of the internet has essentially been in the hands of the creator which in turn has usually been the business sector. A company would create a site that told you all about their product or service and the consumer would look at this and make a decision.

The antecedence of Web3.0 is in the emergence of Social Media via Web2.0.

Web2.0 bought about the emergence of social interactivity through the likes of MySpace, Facebook, Bebo etc. This changed the fabric of the web considerably. People began to interact via the internet in a way never seen before. Social Networks grew and a whole new virtual world was formed.

Everyone has heard me (or a billion other people) talk about how marketing can take advantage of Social Networking and the effects it can have on your business. Web3.0 takes this to a new stratosphere.

Let me give you an example.

With the incredible phenomenon of the iPhone, has come a staggering 140,000+ applications on the Apple AppStore. One of these Apps is a barcode reader. So I download this App to my iPhone and I walk into a Target store to purchase a present for my friend’s 8 year old daughter. Now I have no idea what I’m looking for. In the past I would have been influenced by marketers with clever packaging, product placement, merchandising and advertising. Not any more. I take the doll off the shelf and I take a photo of the barcode through the Barcode App.

INSTANTLY thousands of reviews by real consumers are at my fingertips. After scanning 3 separate dolls and finding which one had the best consumer experience, I make my purchasing decision.

This is not fiction…this is happening in the US as we speak.

Many of you may think that this is more scary for a marketing organisation than it is directly for business and you may be right.

The real issue though, is that the consumer is now becoming more and more powerful and with that, business is going to require a totally new strategy to combat this new found power.

Consumers will begin to review everything in the same way as we so willingly expect that we should ‘google’ something before we buy it. Googling will essentially be taken to a new height and the information will be more instant than ever.

Web3.0 offers a whole range of new challenges for us all. The key at this stage is to have an appreciation that it is happening and look towards strategies in which you can utilise this to your advantage.

Many old fashioned aspects of business will begin to play a new role in business. Customer Service. Value for Money. Honesty and Integrity.

Isn’t it funny how something so new suddenly brings us back to the very foundation of what made the businesses of yesterday year so great…