Wow--for a short while I was a "rock star" book author at the Web 2.0 Expo, with rave book reviews from Tim O'Reilly and John Battelle, being video-blogged by Robert Scoble, audio-blogged for the Seattle PI, interviewed by the BBC and major US newspapers, while hundreds of my just-printed book, Web 2.0: A Strategy Guide, flew off the shelves of the O'Reilly Media booth. I've posted links to these on my website www.amyshuen.com.
My publisher tells me that selling out of 400-500 books in 2 days is record-breaking, And most wonderful of all, I observed browsers decide to buy the book in the morning and then come back an hour or so later for three or four more--for their team, their boss, their co-founders, colleagues and friends.
The most fun of all was meeting and chatting with the folks who were buying my book, while personally autographing their copies. Thanks so much to all of you who shared your stories, interests and questions about Web 2.0 strategy and contact information. In true Web 2.0 fashion, I've tried to aggregate these separate pieces of data and information into the following "collective intelligence" insights...
1. The range of readers interested in Web 2.0 strategy is surprisingly large and diverse.
25% startups, 20% big companies (15% high tech, 5% traditional), 20% service--ad, creative agencies, design, communications, consultancies, 10% media (broadcasting, newspapers, film), 10% public and academic (libraries, universities, education), 15% international
2. Web 2.0 has gone mainstream business--balancing cool and whizzy technology, user experience and consumer-oriented social media startups with the economics of big business, industry, Enterprise 2.0-- making integrated advertising and communities online and offline increasingly important. This reader group appreciates MBA-style analytical tools and strategic frameworks applied to Web 2.0 strategy. So I clump the 20% big companies and the 20% service groups together under mainstream business--assuming that many of the 20% service groups are servicing large business clients with advertising, web design and online communications services.
3. Web 2.0 strategy looks to be the future of the Fortune 50Million as well as the Fortune 500. Although there were very few pizza parlors, pet stores, specialty sports and realty offices represented at the Web 2.0 Expo, bringing world-class but easy to use technology and online services to millions of fragmented small and medium size businesses has always been the holy grail and a challenging untapped and hard to reach market--having some of the characteristics of the individual consumer market and others of the business, professional and industrial marketplaces. I'lll be writing more posts in the future on how Web 2.0 strategy and the economics of web services might bridge this chasm.