When it comes to the Web 2.0 and the process of “creative destruction”, a lot of people associate it more with the latter word than the former. After all, we hear story after story of entire industries being washed away – and what replaces them simply doesn’t provide a livelihood for nearly as many people.
So I find it nice to think about cases where the Web 2.0 is helping businesses in way people may not have been anticipated several years ago. One such case is in relation to small restaurants (and other proverbial “Mom & Pop” shops). They might well learn that the combination of Web 2.0 and mobile devices will help them – a lot. And in the process, it could unleash a wave of creative destruction that society in general may appreciate a lot more than what many see currently taking place.
It’s not a complicated story by any means, and a simple personal story will suffice as an illustration. I eat a lot of sushi. There are tons of sushi places between my office and my house that I can go to. From experience, I know that some are good, and some are bad – but many remain unknown. And I also know from experience that outward appearances are not a particularly good indicator of which ones are which.
So, I recently popped on to Yelp on my iPhone. Within a couple of seconds I scanned through the reviews of various Sushi places. Was surprised to see one very highly rated one, which I’ve walked by numerous times thinking “I’d never go there.” Interesting tidbits in there about how it’s a family run business, and how personal the service can be. Tried it. It’s great. And I probably never would have done so otherwise.
If you extend that little example out across all kinds of local service providers, you can potentially see a beautiful process of creative destruction taking place. Most of us have heard countless story of small, independent places not surviving. Often, it’s because, no matter how great they are, they can’t get enough sustained attention to support themselves. Thanks to services like Yelp, more and more might be able to – perhaps without even spending a penny on direct advertising (i.e. what you actually do means more, how much you spend communicating that means less). Net result: the best places get rewarded, the bar is raised, and every service provider has to get better and better.
A much nicer thing to think about then (say) entire industries being washed away, non? 
