Forrester Research Announces 2009 Forrester Groundswell Award Winners For Excellence In Social Applications

Forrester Research, Inc. (Nasdaq: FORR) today honored 13 Forrester Groundswell Award winners for excellence in achieving business and organizational goals with social technology applications. The third annual Forrester Groundswell Awards were announced at Forrester's Consumer Forum 2009 in Chicago and for the first time included winners in a Business-to-Business (B2B) Division, as well as a Business-to-Consumer (B2C) Division. The Forrester Groundswell Awards support and recognize the principles outlined in the Forrester book Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies (Harvard Business Press, 2008), honored this year with the American Marketing Association Foundation's Berry-AMA Book Prize for best marketing book of 2009.

"Every year the quality of business social applications goes up, and marketers become more sophisticated," said Josh Bernoff, senior vice president, idea development, at Forrester and co-author of Groundswell. "This year's winners stood out in a very competitive field; all of them demonstrate not just creative use of social technologies but impressive, measurable results."

This year, there were more than 140 Forrester Groundswell Award entries. Winners were chosen across a number of categories -- Listening, Talking, Energizing, Supporting, and Embracing -- that represent the strategic goals that Forrester advises organizations to consider when using social technologies to interact with their customers. Additional winners were selected in a special Employee And Non-Profit Division to recognize outstanding social applications in management and social impact. A detailed overview of each winning entry, along with the finalists in each category, is available on the Groundswell Web site. Here are the winners of the 2009 Forrester Groundswell Awards:

Business-To-Consumer (B2C) Division:

-- Listening: NASCAR Fan Council by Vision Critical

-- Talking: Lion Brand Yarn Blog and Podcast by Converseon

-- Energizing: Norton Advocates by Zuberance

-- Supporting: myFICO(R) Online Customer Community by FICO

-- Embracing: Scholastic Book Clubs Reading Task Force Community by Communispace

Employee And Non-Profit Division:

-- Managing: UPSjobs Problem Solved by TMP Worldwide

-- Social Impact: Flowerdale (Australia) Bush Fire Social Outreach

Business-To-Business (B2B) Division:

-- Listening: CDW Advisory Board by Communispace

-- Talking: The Conversation by Eloqua

-- Energizing: UNLEASH 2009, The Mediasite User Conference by Sonic Foundry

-- Spreading: MetricStream Community by Regalix

-- Supporting: commonground Global Community For Environmental Professionals by EDR

-- Embracing: The Archer E-GRC Ecosystem by Archer Technologies

"Looking at this year's B2B winners and finalists, it is clear that technology companies lead the way in achieving real business results in the Groundswell," said Laura Ramos, vice president and principal analyst, Forrester Research. "Social activity will continue to expand into different B2B markets as businesspeople seek out their peers online to exchange ideas and validate their purchase decisions."

For the second consecutive year, the selection process allowed people to rate and comment on all entries on the Groundswell Web site. Forrester took the community's evaluations into account when selecting winners but chose winning entries based on proof of business value, not which applications were the most popular.

About Forrester Research

Forrester Research, Inc. (Nasdaq: FORR) is an independent research company that provides pragmatic and forward-thinking advice to global leaders in business and technology. Forrester works with professionals in 20 key roles at major companies providing proprietary research, consumer insight, consulting, events, and peer-to-peer executive programs. For more than 26 years, Forrester has been making IT, marketing, and technology industry leaders successful every day. For more information, visit www.forrester.com.

(C) 2009, Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved. Forrester is a trademark of Forrester Research, Inc.

SOURCE: Forrester Research, Inc.

Forrester Research, Inc. 
Jon Symons, + 1-617-613-6104 
Director, Media Relations 
press@forrester.com

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