Blog

With some serious implications on the horizon for corporate strategy this year, it is a good time to build a strong web strategy to enable your online assets to weather the storm.

Though many companies are implementing cutbacks, and tightening the purse-strings, now is a crucial time to plan ahead. eMarketer - even in the face of recession - is still predicting an 8.9% worldwide growth in online ad spend this year, from 23.6 billion to $25.7 billion. We expect to see Facebook really tapping some of that cash this year, with its' vamped advertising engine. Can it become a contender to Google's stranglehold? Doubtful. But the model is a very potent one.

Our prediction for 2009 online is an increasing trend towards the trends we have seen in 2008

• Social Media and Social Networking sites (like Facebook, Friendster and LinkedIn) will increase their foothold in the online environment;
• Integrating Social Network features and Relationship Knowledge into communications is a trend in the making
• Search Engines love Blogs (particularly Google) which begs corporations to step up and set up set their Corporate Blogs up as a means of interacting with their users
• Search engine balance of power shakeup this year, as Yahoo teeters on the verge of takeover, and Google loses its' shine as the Golden-Search-Engine-Who-Can-Do-No-Wrong, and Social Media/Networking sites vy for position
• Massive increases in location-specific internet usage, thanks to the extraordinary technology that is Google Maps for Mobile
• New Social Media sites will spring up to challenge the existing megaliths like DIGG, Technorati and del.icio.us which are increasingly becoming victims of SEO SPAM;
• 3G phone-enabled applications, sites and services will experience massive growth in 2009
• Online Video to go mainstream. Broadband speeds worldwide are increasing massively, and set to do so in Australia, as are computer CPU speeds. Finally technology is catching up to the 1997 utopian dream of 'multimedia'. Use of video will become far more widespread.
• Google, Yahoo, MSN, Apple and Facebook APIs which companies can plug their technologies into.
• Cloud Computing technologies for SMEs and large enterprise looking to
• Emerging online ecosystems of Development APIs will become more and more integrated with each other, and with mobile technologies.