Charlene Li is an independent thought leader on emerging technolgies. Her panel focused on social technologies, interactive media, marketing and the future of social networks. She has written on the topic in her blog, “The Altimeter ,” and the book she co-authored, “Groundswell: Winning In A World Transformed By Social Technologies.”
“Social networks will be like air,” said Li. “They will hold everything that we do online and offline.” But Li mentioned it is just the beginning and still very early. Patience will be needed.
What kind of information will be needed for the transition to occur:
1) Identity- who you are
2) Contacts- who you know.
3) Activities- what you do.
Li also emphasized the importance of building a trusting relationship with her example, “In Google We Trust.” She said that Google holds much of her personal information and that she was comfortable with this because of her trust in Google. Li believes that when users feel comfortable in disclosing personal information,
open networks will become the norm.
Her advice in social networking:
1) Evaluate where social makes sense- identify where social netowrk data and content can/should be integrated in the experience; leverage existing identity and social graphs where your audience already is; get your privacy and permission policies and processes aligned with an open strategy; find your trust agents.
2) Get your backend data in order- remove multiple sign-ins, registration, and profiles for people; have a single identity for customers and prospects.
3) Prepare to intergrate social networks into your organization- social networks will disrupt traditional infomation flows.