The 2009 Forrester Groundswell Awards were divided into several categories which I thought were very appropriate. They were listening, talking, energizing, embracing, supporting, managing, spreading and social impact for both B2B and B2C companies.

These action words are what businesses do every day and are great ways to think about online strategy. The days of successful brochure-ware sites are long gone. Today’s web requires engagement and results.

All of the winners are companies that leveraged the collective knowledge of a community, which they created, and facilitated a conversation to do one of more of the action words above.

Results were measured in various types of conversions, traffic stats and other web data, but more importantly, business needs were addressed as well. Consumer or customer opinions were collected that resulted in increased sales and several companies acquired information that affected core business operations, improving processes and saving money.