CardMarketing 2.0

It makes sense, in the first issue of a newsletter called Card Marketing 2.0, to explain what ‘2.0’ actually means. A lot of people are familiar with the Web 2.0 movement, the Web 2.0 buzzword, but few can fully explain it. The difficulty people have defining Web 2.0 – and we’re no different – goes some way to explain it.

Web 2.0 represents an online world that is in a state of flux, a world that is ever-changing because its founders, its foundations are you, me and everybody else. We’re all Web 2.0 creators. Web 2.0 is us.

Roughly, Web 2.0 is the ability of internet users to author their own content and share this content – whether knowledge, information or material possessions – with other users online. And generally for free. Think eBay, Wikipedia, Flickr, craigslist, blogging and Skype, think the proliferation of ‘authentic’ and ‘democratic’ online communities such as YouTube, MySpace and Second Life. Think participation. Think consumer empowerment and collaborative creation.

For card issuers, ‘2.0’ represents the need to think differently about how they market themselves henceforth, the need to adapt to the sometimes alien Web 2.0 climate, and how they can access, traverse and reap strong financial returns out of ever-changing online communities.

To market successfully in a Web 2.0 world, issuers need to rethink top-heavy, top-down direct mail marketing techniques in favour of ‘lightweight’, web-based strategies that spread virally, across. Issuers globally must learn online marketing techniques to start viral fires, must learn to become firestarters. Look at Card Marketing 2.0 as a box of matches.