Palo Alto, CA - September 1, 2009 - Olliance Group announced that Dawn M. Foster, Consultant, Community Builder, Author, Blogger and founder of Fast Wonder, is joining the firm as Senior Executive and Practice Manager of a new Online Community Practice. This practice will focus on helping companies realize business value from building and nourishing new communities, engaging with existing communities, and utilizing social media in comprehensive community strategies.

“Building sustainable, vibrant and commercially rewarding communities while by providing real value to participants, balances art and science. Dawn brings a proven track record of helping companies find that balance,” commented Andrew Aitken, Founder and Managing Partner of Olliance Group. “Dawn’s domain expertise and experience in building successful communities will enable Olliance clients capture and retain developer mindshare and realize the greatest benefit from their community activities”.

Dawn brings over 13 years experience in business and technology with expertise in strategic planning, management, market research, community building, open source software, social media, blogging and RSS. At Intel, Jive Software, and Compiere she held positions ranging from Unix system administrator to market researcher to community manager to open source strategist. Dawn is a co-founder of Legion of Tech, a non-profit serving the Portland technology community, and an organizer for Portland BarCamp and Ignite Portland. Dawn also authored Companies and Communities: Participating without being sleazy.

The Olliance Online Community Practice will leverage the firm’s extensive network of business relationships and experience in navigating the complexities of open source organizations while expanding the impact of Olliance into community building for companies focused on open source software and information communities. The practice comprises distinct services for building communities, participating in existing ones, and leveraging social media. It focuses on developing community strategy to fit within overall organizational strategy, community planning, assisting with implementation, and mentoring and training throughout the process. The practice emphasizes segmenting audiences, seeding compelling content and technology in beta deployment, incorporating real-world events, identifying and implementing effective metrics and social media monitoring to track and enhance community profiles.

About Olliance Group

Olliance Group is the leading open source business and strategy consulting firm. Its mission is to help clients capitalize on the strategic, technological, and financial benefits of open source software. Clients include Fortune 500 enterprises, independent software vendors, start-up firms, venture capital groups and government entities. Olliance’s unique position and experience in the open source ecosystem strengthens its core areas of expertise including open source strategy development, community building, sales and marketing strategies, IP management and compliance, and mergers and acquisitions.

  Download PDF of press release >>   

If you would like more information about this topic please contact

Andrew Aitken
Tel. 650-493-3800 x301
Email: andrew@olliancegroup.com