The professional services industry is increasingly relying on published thought leadership as a platform to recruit new clients.  Examples include webinars, articles, white papers and surveys.

We have observed that while many are happy to upload new content to their websites, few spend enough time exploring how to use web 2.0 to enhance their distribution and awareness.  To start, SLATES is a good checklist.

Andrew McAfee defines web 2.0 based on its features, which together can be referred to as “SLATES”.

Search:  Use keyword search to enhance ease of finding information, thereby making the platform valuable.

Links: Create guides/links to important pieces of information.

Authoring:  Allow for constantly updated content by interlinked communities.

Tags: Categorise content with simple, one-word descriptions to facilitate searching.

Extensions: Automating some services and pattern matching by using ‘formulas’ or algorithms.

Signals: Use RSS (Really Simple Syndication) technology to notify users of any changes of the content by sending e-mails to them.

You too, can target a greater web 2.0 audience with your thought leadership.

Just ask yourself these 6 questions (structured along the lines of SLATES):

1. What key search words will people use to look for this topic?
2. What are some link exchanges we can explore?
3. How can we allow a community to participate in this?
4. How should the web page or uploaded files be tagged?
5. Do we have a mini-app or extension of our own, to encourage more people to participate in this?
6. Have we enabled RSS feeds on this?

For more information, please contact Manifesto