Wikipedia and branding

Introduction

What I won't talk about What I will talk about

How Wikipedia works How to use Wikipedia

Wikipedia from the outside

The history of Wikipedia 1980-1990s – internet, first catalogues, then search engines

2000 – the dot-com bubble collapses, Nupedia

2001 – launch of Wikipedia

2003 – Wikimedia Foundation

2008 – 23 employees

Wikipedia from the outside

61% of you come from Google (Nielsen Online)

4th most popular property on the Internet (28.2% of the 996 million worldwide PC-based web browser audience (comScore)

20 – 45 000 page views – per second

Estimated worth: 7 billion US dollars (Silicon Alley Insider)

Real revenue: 2,734,909 (2007)

How Wikipedia works(for companies)

"Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge.

That’s what we are doing."

- Jimmy Wales

How Wikipedia works(for companies)

Wikipedia is a... freely licensed

and free of charge

encyclopedia of 12 million articles

written by 15 million volunteers

in more than 250 languages

How Wikipedia works(for companies)

+ =

Click ”edit” Write Click ”save” No need to register

How Wikipedia works(for companies)

Quality management on Wikipedia Version handling – article history

Recent changes monitored

Watchlists

User contributions leave tracks

Many enthusiastic volunteers

How Wikipedia works(for companies)

Wikipedia and its competitors collaborative vs experts

having to get along vs own articles

style and own perspective is not scaleable

not-for-profit vs ad-driven

work in progress vs ready from the get-go

Using Wikipedia (for companies)

What if the Wikipedia article about your company is wrong

1) write on talk page

2) contact us – Report an error

3) info-en-q@wikimedia.org

Ask other wikipedians for help

Using Wikipedia (for companies)

Your article on Wikipedia only helpful if you already have traffic, i.e. is notable

if you try, take your time – learn and pay your dues

remember that you are accountable

ask for help

don't delete – add

and as always, must be copyleft

Using Wikipedia (for companies)

Seldom used ways of marketing on Wikipedia donate money, like Alfred P. Sloan

fix something for Wikimedia Foundation, like Yahoo

write an featured article about you

have a user to answer questions about you on Wikipedia

donate pictures – find your niche

Let me give you an example...

Using Wikipedia (for companies)

Michele Merkin

Featured imageBeauty

Glamour photography

Physical attractiveness

Here

is your chance!

Questions?

Don' be shy. Or in Wikipedia vernacular:

Be bold.