In this, my last editor's column for this year, it is time for reflection. It has been one of the toughest and most exhilarating times in the media industry. In finishing off one Masters degree, it felt like I was busy with another in 'new media and the digital transformation of our media landscape globally'. Being a media worker can be one of the most privileged jobs as we get to go to all the benchmarking events in our industry and interview and interact with opinion makers, both locally and internationally. Based on my key learnings, these are my three predictions for 2008: 1) Social networking will change media forever and next year we will see the South African media focus on leveraging their loyal communities through social media networking more and more ; 2) Mobile is the next "killer" marketing application and Africa will probably follow India's example in accessing the Internet via mobile, bypassing the PC in this regard; 3) The 2010 marketing frenzy will begin in earnest as all want a piece of the action and planning for this key continent event moves into high gear... This has also been a growth year for Bizcommunity.com, launching into an additional 17 African countries with our Marketing portal and launching into the FMCG Retail industry in Africa, as well as African Medical community. We trialed and embraced a host of social media applications, including blogging, RSS, polls and other innovations to improve reader contact. We have a host of new innovations coming in 2008, which we will workshop in conjunction with our community of over 100 000 loyal weekly subscribers across all our portals. Look out for our research beginning shortly, we appreciate your participation - you are also the custodians of this much-loved brand.
Happy holidays! Louise Marsland, editor@bizcommunity.co. Marketing news: marketingnews@bizcommunity.co. Responses to this column welcomed on our blog.