The next big thing in B2B e-publishing

Like most publishers, our next stage of growth will come from online and events, to make up for the decline in print. However, more and more, I'm convinced that as we begin to expand beyond "magazine" web sites, we're firmly entering a Web 2.0 world where nothing looks familiar.

As we move away from B2B publishing 1.0, here's what will come next. We just need to figure out how to adapt these trends to our markets and our audiences. And then figure out the revenue angle.


1. No editors. (Did I mention that?). Look for communities to generate their own content that's much more meaningful to the community. For the community. By the community. No editors necessary. (Keep the editors doing their jobs on existing mature properties. But no need for hiring new ones just to launch more e-properties.)

2. Instead of suppliers/advertisers managing customers, we'll want to consider ways we can allow customers to manage suppliers. This is called vendor relationship management and inverts the whole supplier/buyer paradigm. Publishers connect sellers with buyers today. Tomorrow, they will need to learn how to connect buyers with sellers. On buyers' terms. As publishers, we need to ingest this into our DNA. That'll be tough...many of us are focused on how we can deliver buyers to sellers, on the sellers' terms. (Think lead generation.)

3. Sophisticated invitation-only social networking tools allow buyers control who they let into their networks. Think buddy list for B2B. By the way, this isn't for liver-spotted white males over the age of 40. This is for the mypsace-wielding set coming out of school now and getting their first jobs, quite used to social networking in school, and willing to use such tools for work.

Some links that I've been reading/listening to and finding interesting, in support of the above:

The social customer blog

The Clue Implementation unit -- a hands-on podcast about connecting customers, communities, and business.

The E-Sourcing Forum blog.

And more. Will continue to share new things I find.