The Web 2.0 playing field is changing, it’s changing from a toy or play medium that Gen Y ran with to a serious Web 2 tool that businesses of all sizes are using in their business marketing strategies. Web 2.0 as a business model is growing, it’s deepening and the social, business and cutural applications are being added as fast as new names can be created.

Generation Y was the first to see the benefits of Web 2.0 social media. Suddenly friends, aquaintances and relatives were boxed away safely in one place online. Guys rummaged through networks to find the cute girls and photos of football games. Girls did the same.

Although not the first application, Facebook stormed crowds with similar tastes, interests or hobbies to a new level. Then Second Life created a virtual world for people to stroll around with their alter egos, LinkedIn claimed shortcuts for older white-collar professionals and lately Twitter has blasted on to the scene.

Gen Y is still active but the hungry audience of the new web are older, often in business or the corporate world. And statistics tell us there are a lot of them. They can see the implications of reaching prospective clients and customers regualarly especially with the cost, implementation and delivery methods being so  accessible.

But it’s easy to get overwhelmed. There’s so much out there to choose from. Finding the best social networks for branding your corporte identity can be difficult. You can start with the best known for your business web marketing but in the end who you choose should be part of an overall business marketing strategy and not some loose end. This is a great way to get eyeballs and very cheap web traffic  but without an objective you are wasting your resources.

Twitter

The majority of Twitter users worldwide are 35 or older. Just over ten percent of Twitter population in the US is between 18-24 and tweet less often.

LinkedIn

Gen Y is not on LinkedIn. LinkedIn profiles do two things. They sneeze out to the world all the great things you’ve accomplished and connect people in your industry.

Not surprisingly most LinkedIn users are 40 years and over. Gen Y hasn’t stockpiled a heap of things to shout about; they’re still discovering what industry they want to be in and their connections aren’t very connected. 

LinkedIn did a major marketing push offering grads their premium service for a three month free trial; even pitching the site as a way to get jobs. It’s not working.

So has LinkedIn failed to get Gen Y or is Gen Y too busy? 

Facebook

Facebook is growing with chilling speed. New adopters are between 35 to 54 years old which grew at a rate of 276% over the last six months and the 55 and over demographic grew by almost 200% for the same period. Meanwhile, 18-24 year olds only grew 20%.

 Over 35’s are also joining Twitter where it’s all about real-time updates. 

In fact, when Facebook made design changes comparable to Twitter astonishingly the angry mob wasn’t older demographic groups shaking in fear of change but from the long time Facebook users; Gen Y.
 
Those aged over 45 years are actively taking up Web 2.0 social media consumer technology including blogs and podcasts almost 20 times faster than younger generations. Gen Y consumers are reversing their bull charge away from social networking, blogging, podcasting and internet videos. 

What happened and where are they going?

It’s possible that Gen Y has decided that too much is too much. Gen Y may have liked flirting with Web 2.0 but are no longer interested now that the wrappers are off. Maybe when the lights came on it just wasn’t what they expected. After all, chatting over a glass of wine wins hands down over a hot screen and mouse.

Unexpectedly older users have scratched the social media surface and found new strategies beyond the cool PR fog that early Gen Y adopters ran looking for.

Even Chris Cox, Facebook’s Director of Products says, "The people who started the company weren’t cool. I’m not cool, if you look at the people who work here, it’s much more nerdy and curious than cool… Cool only lasts for so long, but being useful is something that applies to everyone."

He’s right. Gen Y are chasing cool not useful. But thousands of others have found useful applications for unexpected things like enhancing branding corporte identity, supporting web marketing, implementing business marketing strategy and are devouring it. 

These are some of the Web 2.0 tools you should consider in your Web 2.0 business model to get cheap web traffic, develop social media networking and develop transparency between you and prospective clients. They will help you with positioning marketing faster and provide many marketing solutions other mediums struggle to deliver.

See you back here soon,

Christine 

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