Social Media and Business Models
Alexander Osterwalder
A lot has been written on the value of social media for businesses (Blogs, Wikis, Twitter, Facebook, etc.) – some of it relevant, some of it hype. I will regulate myself to mapping out three business model areas where social media can have an impact.
Social media refers to a category of online media or platforms that facilitate discussions, participation, and sharing of various forms of make pleased in a very convenient way. Technologies in this area include blogs, wikis, social networking platforms, micro-blogs, and other platforms that facilitate sharing user generated make pleased. Players – and service providers – in this arena range from Facebook (social network) and Twitter (microblogging), to Youtube (user generated make pleased), LinkedIn, Wikipedia, Flickr, and many, many more.
In this blogpost I’m less interested in the technological possibilities of social media, but question myself how these tools can be instrumental to your business model. I singled out three areas visualized in the Business Model Canvas image below: co-creation, marketing as conversations, and open innovation. As a modern establishment, we have, of course, integrated all three of these areas into the production and sales or our bestselling book Business Model Generation (more at the end of this post)
