It’s that time of year. The new year has begun, a time to reflect on the past 12 months and develop those Top 10 lists for 2008. And so AIIM did earlier this week, with its Top 10 Most-read content items from the AIIM Website, published in its Infonomics online Magazine.
I am proud to report that among the Top 5, the work done by myself and Dan Keldsen placed 3 times, Numbers 1, 3 and 5 (Hmm how odd - pun intended). OK - thanks for giving me that moment of blatant pride.
That said, there is more here to talk about than our success in creating valuable content. This ranking of the most popular content actually sheds light on the ECM market. All things being equal – and for the most part they were (I'll explain that further in just a moment), the #1 download was the Market IQ report on Findability. One of the findings in that report was a pent-up user demand for "findability" within the corporate Intranet, as good as that experienced on the commercial Internet. This pent-up need is apparently a "most" compelling need, given the popularity of the download over all other AIIM content (not just Market IQs), and there was much to pick from in format and topic.
Speaking of other topics, #3 was the Market IQ on Enterprise 2.0. What I find interesting here is the fact that this seemingly hot and edgy topic did not pull as great an interest level as the more basic "Findability". Despite the market buzz surrounding Enterprise 2.0, it may still seem more of a future direction, or area of experimentation, versus a more compelling need to get search and navigation done right. Indeed, as we pointed out in the Findability report, Findability is fundamental to all content, including Enterprise 2.0 content. If you do not get your information architecture right, and cannot provide intuitive and effective access paths to the content, the content is rendered virtually useless, Enterprise 2.0 or otherwise.
Before I move onto #5, lets talk a bit about #2 - not something written by Dan and me. The #2 most popular piece of content was the AIIM Buyers Guide. Hmmm - potential good news for the ECM software market. Although just a single data point, it is at least one indication that organizations are still looking into potential investments in ECM this year. Indeed, I have had a few colleagues share with me recently their intentions to make purchases in software that can demonstrate significant savings - i.e. by replacing aging ECM solutions/architectures and by short circuiting processes and thus maintaining productivity levels with less staff (including potential outsourcing models.)
OK - as my narcissistic friend in New Hampshire likes to say, "Back to me." #5 was the Market IQ report on Business Process Management. Here is a technology that is as practical, if not more so than "findability", and in direct alignment with buying intentions AIIMed (I couldn't resist that pun) at short circuiting processes. This is undoubtedly why it ranked in the top 5. But you have to wonder, given its tactical nature and relevancy to current buying intentions, why did it not rank higher? Perhaps here is a case in which not all things were not equal. This Market IQ was not released until October, and thus there has been far less time for "Googlers" to find it, perhaps.
Indeed, this may also account for why the Market IQ on On Ramps and Off Ramps did not make the top 10 list. It was not published until the end of the third week of December.
So as the Red Socks (used to) say – "Maybe next year."
By the way, all four reports are still available for free download, so if you have not yet, you may want to grab a copy.
