Eine letzte Runde Startup Presentations - wir erwarten Christian Ludwig (Carmondo), Stefan Röschinger (guut.de), Oliver Ueberholz (Mixxt), Jan-Hendrik von Ahlen (JobLeads) & Kununu.

Christian Ludwig, Carmondo

Christian Ludwig (Carmondo)
Carmondo, co-finanziert von Sixt, vermittelt Autos. Oder besser: Carmondo hilft Verbrauchern, indem die vielen Internetangebote vorgefiltert werden. Das Ganze geschieht in bester Web 2.0-Manier Community-basiert, durch User-generated Content und Foren.

Einerseits: Ist der deutsche Konsument wirklich von der Vielfalt im Netz überfordert, wie Ludwig behauptet? Andererseits: Schaden kann der Austausch mit Gleichgesinnten auf keinen Fall. Die geplanten Entwicklungsstufen von simplen Blogs & Foren hin zur umfassenden Social Media Strategie scheint jedenfalls schlüssig.

Stefan Röschinger, guut.de

Stefan Röschinger (guut.de)

Liveshopping ist angesagt bei guut.de. Derzeit sieben Leute entwickeln diese Weblösung für ein "echtes Shopping-Erlebnis" - in Abgrenzung zu klassischen Onlineshops, in denen Shopper eher allein sind. Recht offen gibt guut.de zu, sich am amerikanischen woot.com zu orientieren. Aber Inspirierenlassen ist erlaubt, wenn das Ergebnis stimmt. Ob das hier der Fall ist, werden die Nutzer bewerten.

Guut.de bietet pro Tag exakt einen Artikel an - solange Vorrat reicht. Ziel ist dabei, für 24 Stunden den besten Preis auf dem Markt anzubieten. Eine kurze Umfrage im Publikum ergibt, dass Liveshopping im Netz zumindest hier bislang kein allzu großes Thema ist. Wenn woot.com allerdings so erfolgreich ist wie hier behauptet, dann gibt es hier nicht unerhebliches Wachstumspotenzial. Allein sind guut.de nicht: Unter anderem tummelt sich auch Preisbock in diesem Marktsegment.

Oliver Ueberholz, Mixxt

Oliver Ueberholz (Mixxt)

Nicht Shopping, sondern die Community selbst steht im Mittelpunkt bei Mixxt. Frisch in die Präsentation bringt Oliver Ueberholz eine neue Mixxt-Website: Gerade heute Mixxt auch in Polen gelauncht. Mixxt ist ein Baukasten für Social Networks zum Selberbauen. Mit eigenem Branding und hohem Grad an Kontrolle klickt sich per Mixxt ein Social Network quasi von selbst zusammen.
Mixxt hat als regelmäßiger Gast auf Barcamps und Konferenzen einen gewissen Vorsprung vor den anderen Vortragenden - die Technologie ist durchaus schon sehr fortgeschritten, granulare Kontrolle der Privacy-Einstellungen können hier nur als Indikator gelten.

Oliver Ueberholz stellt vor allem Use-Cases vor: Mixxt kann demnach genutzt werden, um Vereinsarbeit zu visualisieren (Tennisverein), zur Lobbyarbeit (Metzgerfachverband) oder für Community-Building oder Branding (als White Label-Lösung). Interessant für Corporate Kunden: White Label heißt in diesem Fall tatsächlich White Label, Mixxt taucht als Markenname dann nicht mehr auf.

Frage aus dem Publikum #1: Wie bedient man die User, die in vielen Social Networks sind?
Antwort: Ein einziger Mixxt-Login genügt um sich in bei allen weiteren Mixxt-Communities einzuloggen.

Frage #2: Was, wenn andere auf Euren Plattformen Geld verdienen wollen?
Antwort: Ist in unserem Interesse - wer Geld mit uns verdient, pusht auch unsere Dienste.

Nächste Schritte für Mixxt: Launch in Polen, die Entwicklung einer API und der Launch in China.

Jan-Hendrik von Ahlen, Jobleads

Jan-Hendrik von Ahlen (JobLeads)

Jobleads ist eine Jobvermittlungsplattform. Warum braucht die Welt noch eine neue Recruitingplattform, fragt Mitgründer von Ahlen: Es gibt bislang drei Jobvermittlungskanäle: Headhunter (teuer), Online-/Print-Stellenanzeigen (Zielgruppe muss schon aktiv suchen), persönliche Empfehlungen (gut, aber schwer skalierbar). Es sind die latent Wechselwilligen, die Jobleads ansprechen möchte.

Wie? Durch Exklusivität, unter einem Jahreseinkommen von unter 40.000 Euro ist der Zugang nicht erwünscht (nicht möglich?). Persönliche Empfehlungstools und finanzielle Anreize für erfolgreiche Vermittlung sollen die Effizienz steigern. Wie bei Headhuntern fließt auch hier nur dann Geld an Jobleads, wenn eine Stelle erfolgreich vermittelt wurde. Jobleads und vermittelnde User teilen sich das Geld 20/80. Auch Jobleads gibt es als White Label Lösung.

Nett: Der Vorschlag, Onlinecommunities über die Stellen-Vermittlungsprämien von Jobleads zu finanzieren.

Kununu

Kununu

Noch eine Jobwechslerplattform, aber mit einem komplett anderen Ansatz ist Kununu: Bei der österreichischen Plattform (betrieben von zwei Brüdern plus einem befreundeten Designer) müssen sich Firmen quasi bei den potenziellen Arbeitnehmern bewerben. Arbeitnehmer bewerten auf der Plattform ihre Arbeitgeber, wer auf Kununu nicht bewertet ist, sollte (später, bei entsprechender Marktdurchdringung) mit Vorsicht genossen werden.

Unternehmen können bewertet, aber auch kommentiert werden. (Damit keine einzelnen Personen durch den Dreck gezogen werden, moderiert Kununu die Kommentare.) Kununu will explizit keine Hetzplattform sein. Sympathisch, nicht nur weil es ein wenig nach Community-Projekt aussieht. Kooperationspartner sind u.a. StepStone, Jobs.ch und Jobleads.

Plazes, inzwischen auch in einer deutschen Version verfügbar, ist eine der größeren Web 2.0-Erfolgsgeschichten. Stefan Kellner gibt einen Überblick, was sich in letzter Zeit bei Plazes getan hat.

Neben einigen Updates kleinerer Features (bessere Google Maps-Integration, mehr Kalender- und Empfehlungsfunktionen und allgemein verbesserter Lernfähigkeit der Plattform) ist vor allem eines relevant: Der Erfolgsgeschichte der Facebook-Plattform öffnet auch Plazes sich für Entwickler. Eine API und eine wachsende Community könnten zu neuen Mash-Ups und - damit verbunden - wachsenden Userzahlen führen.

Fast schon niedlich ist zu beobachten, Wie schwer sich Plazes damit tut, ihre eigene Plattform von englisch auf deutsch zurückzuübersetzen.

Betatester aufgepasst: Im Juni gibt's ein Sneakpreview der neuen Version. (iPhone-Besitzer aufgepasst!) Email an support@plazes.com genügt. Stefan Kellner ist sonst auch per Twitter ansprechbar.

Just some impressions of the lovely folks around. In no particular order.

Meet Tinythoughts. Jodie is now "officially a brand". Good on ya!

Fighting the sun: Thomas Praus aka DJ Stylewalker.

Co-Liveblogger Steffen Büffel, Media-Ocean
Expect more photos after tonight's Onlinekapitäne-Party (courtesy of MySpace).

We're here to learn how to use social media to engage your target audience - which happens to be the subtitle of this panel, too. Why is this so important? Consumers are spending massive amounts of time on social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace or StudiVZ. (For exact figures, you'll have to ask Jupiter Research.)

Even in Europe, where we lag behind the U.S. in terms of social networking use, there's a very strong trend towards engaging stronger and more often in social networking services. Same goes for other kinds of social media, like for example weblogs.

And in all those places, consumers people talk about brands. This, of course, can be pretty scary for enterprises: The discussion has moved to a place where companies and marketers have very little control over the conversation. So becoming part of that conversation is important for brands and marketers, and it's hard, if you try with the traditional marketer's mindset.

What's even harder is measuring success: There are basically no reliable, established and proven metrics to measure the kind of engagement you encounter in social networking sites. Without metrics, though, there can't be evaluation, so marketers cannot prove their success, or find out why a campaign was not successful. These metrics is what Jupiter Research is after.

Nate Elliott shows, for the first time, the new Rules of Social Marketing:

#1: Your Messages Aren't Going to Promote Themselves
For an Intel campaign, Jupiter found a direct connection between traffic&engagement and paid advertising. When paid ads stopped, traffic died.

#2: Focusing on Engagement Can Double Your ROI
MySpace and Facebook aren't your brand microsite. Different rules apply in social networks, many marketers forget that. Great example of how not to do it: A promo site on Facebook for the most recent Rambo movie showed just the trailer, no interactive elements at all - it was just a microsite, not a real social networking format. Please do engage your audience.

#3: If You're Not Measuring Results, You're Wasting Your Money
Elliott shows to ways to measure results, even though neither of them is perfect. It's either surveys (which measure beliefs) or technology (which measures actions). Either way, you need to have goals, and metrics to measure, in order to reach your goals.

(One hint Elliott gave right in the end: If you're planning to rely on viral alone, you're as good as doomed. Just don't do that.)

Great workshop - I just added Nate Elliott on Twitter.

Props to the organizers: Except for the wireless that keeps cutting out - and let's face it: At which conference doesn't it? - everything works just fine.

Not only is there enough juice for my laptop, but also for me. (Hint: Power outlets at all the columns!) Even standing here behind Conference Room 1, out in the shade by the lonely LAN cable that allows me to post this, a friendly soul of the catering service brings me an ice-cold drink.

Neat. Thanks to the great service staff!

Just sayin'.

First up: Jeremy Ruston of British Telecom.

"Decaffeinating Tea, what's that supposed to mean?", you might be asking yourself. (I sure did.) What's hiding behind the slightly odd title is the question of how individuals are treated, and how they function, in large corporations. Most importantly, what has changed for employees as a person and for the enterprise in what today we call Enterprise 2.0?

Trust in enterprises has always been a problem: As a cog in the machine, the employee has never been faced with too much trust by their enterprises. In the digital age, things got even worse, just think of the stories you've heard about emails where colleagues have cc'd (or even bcc'd) the boss for strategic reasons, i.e. because they didn't trust their colleagues.

Time, and how people spend it in their jobs, is another issue. Good question raised by Jeremy: If Google's (or any other company's for that matter) employees spend 20% of their time researching on stuff they're personally interested in, what do they work on the other 80% of their working time on?

Teenagers today grow up with an incredibly high media and technology awareness and the relevant skills. Those Digital Natives really know their tech, and their web 2.0 tools. How can enterprises exploit this, or at least not scare those future employees away? After all, if a digital native isn't able to apply his skills and knowledge in his workplace because corporate policies and infrastructure won't allow the tools and practices, it's a lose-lose situation: The employee will be frustrated, the employer can't get the maximum value for their money.

So how does British Telecom harness the Web 2.0 generation? According to Jeremy Ruston, BT has been pretty early on in the adoption curve. Just to give an example: Use of Facebook was encouraged early on.

Next up: Luis Suarez Rodriguez of IBM.

IBM, if Luis Suarez is indication, is pretty far ahead on the adoption curve. "Collaboration allows us to tap into the power of people" says one slide which analyzes how we ask out peers and friends for advice in one-on-one situations. How to harness this very mechanism and make it scale to larger groups is one of the big challenges being tackled in our days.

Now it would be great to not only explicitly ask for advice, but to also collaborate more implicitly. Do I really have to write an email to find out which music album to buy as a birthday gift? Probable not - if you manage to tap into smart communities. Technology can enable and foster this kind of exchange, it can help foster relationships between individuals, thus creating a community. It's people, not data. That's the very core of online collaboration.

Email is obviously not the way to go. (Challenge: Ask Stowe Boyd about email!) So how can we harness the power of communities? Trust is a key issue: Without trust you cannot anything done. The main challenge, though, is to shift from a controlled, regulated environment to a dynamic environment that fosters spontaneous collaboration - forget org trees! Rodriguez's message is clear: Email is too inflexible, go for Wiki-style collaboration. (With this presentation, he could've easily passed at a Barcamp, too - they'd have loved him.)

The key message in this panel is clear: The age of traditional branding is over. As our connectedness and social life online evolve, branding too becomes more social: Brands increasingly have to rely on their customers', friends' and social networks' recommendations - which is also the core of viral marketing. It it's not funny, inspiring or otherwise compelling (Maymann calls it emotional, you wouldn't pass that YouTube video on to your friends, right? But if you do, your friends might watch it just because it was you who sent it. You basically vouch for the content you pass along.

Of course this puts campaigners and communications agencies into a tricky situation: On the one hand, they want to push their clients' messages out there; on the other hand, they need the help of those very customers they're trying to target. Go wrong, and your customers will hold it against you. Social media need a very different approach than traditional media if you want to succeed.

One lessen I learned today? Obviously, if you plan on going viral, funny videos are still the way to go.

Great question from the audience: Social media seem to aim primarily at younger target groups, 40 to 50 years at max. With the massive demographic shift, how can companies reach out to older audiences and engage with them? Maymann doesn't have the answer. Let's not hold it against him just yet: The whole field of social media is so young that it'll need a few years to mature along with those not-so-young folks out there.

"Shut up!" Werner Vogels of Amazon makes it very clear that all the chatting isn't really appreciated. The new-found silence is greeted by the audience with applause. Now we can start. Animoto serves as an example to demonstrate Amazon's Webservices. Animoto, which is basically a slideshow creator on speed (that combines images and sounds to create compelling videos) lives completely in the cloud. Practically all info is pulled in from external services (Flickr etc.) and processed on flexible Amazon server cycles, where the videos are rendered.

This may not sound too special, but it really is, if you think about it: There's basically no hardware in the whole company, no server infrastructure to be maintained. Everything you need you can rent on the web as you grow: Animoto wa slowly growing until they launched a Facebook app - and went completely viral. Just a few years back, this would have lead to insurmountable scalability issues, these days you can think about scaling when you actually need it. So here we pretty much have a radically different situation for entrepreneurs. (According to the presentation, web companies used to spend 70% of their time on infrastructure work and only 30% on innovation. Amazon claims this has changed. A lot.)

Another issue with regular, central server centers: You might remember the major outage of a big San Francisco-based service provider a few months back. Despite their eight diesel power generators, during a power outage they couldn't keep up their servers - six of the backup generators failed, according to this speech. A good chunk of the web services based in the Bay Area died that day. This might actually really be a good reason for decentralized hosting.

So far, this speech has been more convincing than some of the presentations in the Elevator Pitch Panel, so it should be interesting to see what the more technologically inclined members in the audience will be asking. Server admins, step forward!

Question from the audience: What about Security? Of course, that's one of the key aspects for practically any serious startup. Legal jurisdictions are a challenge here - depending on where your data is stored, different laws and regulations apply, different governmental and non-governmental players could get access to your (and your users') data.

I'd be curious: Who has experience with Amazon webservices or their Automatic Backup USB Stick? If you do, please share in the comments.

While most attendees catch some rays & get to know each other, some have a different agenda.

Martin Recke, organizer of next08, refuses to be stressed out: Despite there being some 1000 folks to take care of, he's all relaxed. (Thanks!)

Co-blogger Volker Agüeras Gäng makes some plans on his notepad. What you can't see here is that it says "re:publica 08" on the back. Cheeky bloggers, eh?

In the meantime, Team Jimdo makes the best of the lunch break by showing off their new Jimdo Race Car in front of the conference building.

Time for us liveblogger to get some food, too: There's still plenty of sessions to attend!

My favorite Panel of the day, expectation-wise: Stowe Boyd meets Steve Rubel. This should be good. So let's dive right in:

Steve Rubel quotes Groundswell & insists that all of us in the industry have, to some degree, tunnel vision: We think that everybody is active in the social media sphere, blogging, twittering, using RSS. However, only 13% (says Rubel) are "Creators", i.e. actively produce content on the web. The rest are rather consumers. A quick check with the audience shows: Even here at next08, only about 15-20% are on Twitter. This surprises me - my Twitter client is going crazy with next08 news.

So what does that mean? It's still to complicated to really put stuff on the web. However, providing easier ways to publish, or even to re-publish information is key. Make it simple to re-publish your stuff! Widgets are one way to go, simple embed codes are another. Of course there's many others, too.

Rubel speaks of faint signals that pose challenges. Attention crash is a major one: We can't really keep up with the hundreds of emails. (I imagine Stowe Boyd has a thing or two to say about this.) Digital curators who pre-filter information can help fight information. While it's a great term, this idea seems a bit oldschool, at least in the sense that curators could be replaced by collaborative filters. Talking of collaboration, this is another trend Rubel sees: The internet has been, is, and will be used in more and more collaborative ways. Think pledgebank. Rubel points out one problem of online collaboration, though; When our info lives in the cloud, be prepared for data leak. We're talking about technological solutions, which are never perfect. At some point, some of your data will leak.

Some good points there - let's see what Stowe Boyd replies.

Enter Stowe Boyd">Stowe Boyd, author of /Message, with an apology: Years of blogging, he says, have transformed him and his presentation style. In order to follow his presentation, we'll all have to transform as well, we need to become active participants. (Now isn't that a neat trick to kick off your presentation? Heh.) But Boyd makes his point: The web has changed tremendously from the solitary, a-social web 1.0 to the inherently very social web 2.0 world.

Memorable slide: "Social = Me First". That's not to say, Boyd stresses, that folks out there are selfish. But everybody is naturally to some degree self-centered, people define themselves through relationships with other people. "And that's good!"

"The Web is no democracy, but it's not a hierarchy." Boyd keeps slinging out these slides that are just so sticky. The web has tribal characteristics: Friendships & relationships change - whether you call it "continuous partial friendships" (D. Weinberger) or "niche friendships" (Boyd), some friends we only bond with over very specialized, fractured, long tail-ish relationships. This ties right into Boyd's next point, which is also one of his favorite topics: The Web of Flow (as opposed to email). Tools like Twitter, lifestreaming, workstreamer, friendfeed, just to name a few, they work very different from the old point-to-point, a-synchronous way of communication. Good example: His kids simply refuse to use voicemail - it's too slow, too time-intense, doesn't tie into their daily life flow. "If it's important, it'll resurface", they think. Good point, eh?

Good stuff - keep an eye on Stowe Boyd's vendetta against email and pro flow tools!

Blogging live from Panel 2, where Michael Jennings' presentation about Google's hot mobile platform Android is being shown on the web. (The real workshops here start at 11:00. First up: "simplifying Analytics for Marketeers".)

A few words by the way of introduction: My name is Peter Bihr. When I'm not liveblogging from a conference, I consult on social media strategies. In other words, I work for the Internets. Today we blog on www.fischmarkt.de and next08.com. My regular blog homes are TheWavingCat.com and Blogpiloten.de. Let's also connect via Twitter.

If you're around, make sure to say hi. But for now, the most important thing is: Enjoy the conference!