It seems Obama is going to continue the use of these technologies through his new website, An American Moment, www.change.gov. The site features Web 2.0 technologies such as newsfeeds, a blog, online video, online applications for jobs in the Obama-Biden administration, online search, and an online forum where you can share your ideas and visions for the future.

With Obama’s continued presence on social networking sites, as well as his new change.gov site, Americans will definitely have a way to continue to interact with him well after the campaign is over and he’s taken on the presidency.

Change is something that all of us should consider for our organizations. With uncertain economic conditions ahead, it’s a good time for companies to evaluate their own strategies and policies and see if a change is in order in order to succeed, or even survive, hard times. Here are some questions that may generate discussion about whether you need to change:

Do you need to evolve the way you engage with customers?

• Do you allow two-way communication with your customer?
• Can customers easily ask you questions and post their thoughts about your solutions?
• Do you allow customers to communicate with each other?
• Are your customers receiving targeted, useful information from you?
• Do you get regular feedback from sales and channel reps about customer concerns?

Changes you can make now:

• Add Web 2.0 technologies (blogs, Wikis, RSS feeds, videos, etc.) to your websites so different types of online visitors can interact with you
• Create an online forum where customers can interact with your company, and each other.
• Evaluate how potential customers hear about your webinars, demos, and white papers. Make the lead generation path from awareness to registration clear and simple.
• Segment your e-mail lists by collecting reader preferences to ensure that customers receive targeted, useful information from you.
• Set up company pages on LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace, and other appropriate social networking sites.

Do you need to change the way you position your company?

• Have your products and solutions evolved?
• Has your target audience changed?
• Is your brand still fresh, modern, and on target?

Changes you can make now:

• Set up your website so you can update it easily and often.
• Organize your site to allow visitors to quickly and easily find the information that they need.
• Update your positioning to reflect product, solution, and target audience changes.
• Incorporate feedback from sales reps, your channel, and customers.

If everything is working right now, and you have as much business as you can handle, you might need to make only minor adjustments to your marketing to grow your company. But, during the current economic challenges, changes in your marketing may be essential to not only growth, but survival.

Here’s another idea to add to the video mix: Create a video to answer your Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ).

Your sales reps probably report back to the CEO, VP of Sales, and CMO, describing all the tough questions and objections they are hearing from potential customers. Hopefully, you’ve taken that information and used it to adjust some of your product positioning for web pages and PowePoint presos—marcom pieces that can be updated reasonably fast. However, Flash-based product demos and collateral are not something that can be updated as fast.

A video FAQ can be updated relatively easily by videotaping short segments showing your representatives (top sales reps, the CEO, product evangelists—doesn’t have to be the same person) answering the most commonly asked questions. Post the video responses on the site in an easy-to-find section. Be open and honest about objections that you are hearing and clear the air about them right on your site. You know that these questions are going to be asked any way, so why not answer them early in the buying process.

Don’t worry about having super high-quality video. Site visitors are now used to seeing less than professional quality video. As long as the sound and lighting are decent, site visitors will enjoy quickly and easily hearing a company rep answer these questions. It doesn’t need to include an corporate glitz or razzle dazzle…just straight talk from your organization.

Set up a “video day” each month, where a few new video segments are taped. Segments can be very short – less than a minute in most cases. Swap out segments that lose their relevance with the newest, most urgent issues. The best part of the video FAQ is the relative ease of keeping it updated. Best of all, potential customers will appreciate your honesty and preparation…it will show you are thinking about their business challenges.