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Run Business 2.0 with Web 2.0 Tools

Written by: Gourab Nanda

Article Overview: Do you know that apart from blogs, bookmarking, and Orkuts there are many other Web 2.0 tools that you can utilize within your organization? The basic premise of Web 2.0 is the use of tools online, rather than on your desktop. It enables collaboration with a larger audience and encourages knowledge sharing – particularly useful for small businesses and start-ups. Here are some Web 2.0 tools that you can use.

Run Business 2.0 with Web 2.0 Tools

You must have heard a lot about the Web 2.0 phenomenon and the things that it brings along – interactive websites, blogs, social networks, forums, wikipedias, and a lot of other collaborative web-based tools and applications. You might have been amazed to discover the sheer number of people who are hooked-on to these. But have you been able to effectively leverage this opportunity to aid your business? Do you know that apart from blogs, bookmarking, and Orkuts there are many other Web 2.0 tools that you can utilize within your organization? Last month we had discussed about some of the virtual technologies, this month we move forward to give you info on some of the latest web tools.

The basic premise of Web 2.0 is the use of tools online, rather than on your desktop. It enables collaboration with a larger audience and encourages knowledge sharing – particularly useful for small businesses and start-ups. So, here are some Web 2.0 tools that you can use:

Online collaboration tools

Tools that allow online creation and sharing of documents and spreadsheets are very useful in collaborating information from various sources. Your team-members can access the files from any location and can edit them. This dramatically improves communication within an organization and is a great way to track project progress where many people are involved. Two such free tools are Google Documents and Spreadsheets and Zoho Writer. There are many other tools offered by Google that you can use with a single Gmail account.

You can also conduct online webinars for internal and external audience using services provided by websites like GoToWebinar and Webex. All you need to do is upload the list of people you want to invite and rest all happens as you plan – the reminders are sent prior to the webinars, satisfaction is rated, and analysis is done. The session can be extremely interactive with tools like voting and live chat. Octopz, ProjectSpaces, and Zimbra are advanced online collaboration tools that help you synchronize messages and plan your work. You can even make Wik.is for your own organization to share knowledge.

30 Boxes online calendar can be used to make plans and communicate them to people. It has big boxes for each day of the month in which you can fill tasks that have to be done and then all the reminders will be sent automatically to the right people – you will never forget to follow-up with this tool. You can also do the same with Monkeyon.

Business process management tools

There are many online tools that help you plan, execute, share, and monitor progress of business tasks efficiently. Most small business owners are still relying on plain old Excel sheets and Outlook for almost all types of planning and finance-related work, while there are many free and specialized online tools that can be put to use. The prime reason why you should try these services is because they are innovatively designed to manage only one specific task like CRM, sales, human resource management, accounting, planning and forecasting, project management, et al. Because of this specialization, the tools have alerts, templates, and intuitive features that cater to that particular need and enable faster and easier operation.

You can use Sales Boom for on-demand CRM; Huddle, Project360, or Actionize for efficient project management; NoteSake to manage and store your ideas; Flowchart to create process flows in a collaborative way; Xero for online business accounting; TimeXChange to share timesheets; HSX Research or Inkling for predicting and planning; Koral for content management; Workday for HRM; BazaarVoice to get consumer opinions; Gaboogie for managing conference calls; the list is endless.

Web 2.0 tools can help SMBs in advertising too. AdCandy allows consumers to develop advertising slogans and suggest product improvements for their favorite brands. Zixxo allows small businesses to create and manage their own online coupons and syndicate them out to local consumers through partner websites and RSS feeds.

Web 2.0 is surely the way to go, but if you are still irresolute about your opinions, here are a few benefits that might encourage you to get started:
 Web 2.0 services are usually cheap, or free for use if the need is not high - free trials are always available
 Most of Web 2.0 tools are based on open standards, and so they are easy to integrate with many other relevant applications
 These services are user-friendly, easy to implement, and offer greater flexibility
 Because of the nature of Web 2.0, all applications open new ways for greater and global collaboration
 Online applications enable easy access from anywhere across the world, so you won’t have to synchronize data every time

If you want to explore the Web 2.0 world, visit Go2Web20 and click on the tags for which you want to see Web 2.0 tools and examine the one that meets your need.

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Article Tags: bookmarking, collaborative web, external audience, free tools, gmail account, google, google documents and spreadsheets, interactive websites, many other tools, online collaboration tools, project progress, sheer number, social networks, start ups, ups, virtual technologies, web tools, webinars, wikipedias, zimbra



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