More businesses are embracing social tools to build internal and external communities, improve communications, and delight customers.

When the Enterprise 2.0 conference, a UBM TechWeb event, opens in Boston next week, corporate technology and community managers hope to shift some of the conversation away from potential applications and toward real achievements.

Conference track organizers for Enterprise 2.0 say they expect to spend less time selling a vision for enterprise social networking and collaboration because the vision is more widely understood. Turning it into a reality for more people is still going to take some work, however. The Enterprise 2.0 conference is sponsored by our publisher, UBM, and brings together technology and business leaders exploring the potential of Web 2.0 and social media in the enterprise.

“One thing that I think has changed is we’ve kind of entered the mainstream—most executives at most companies are kind of intrigued and exploring,” said Rachel Happe, who is chairing the conference track on managing communities to engage external audiences. Some of those business leaders are still seeking to establish a business case for moving forward, she said, “but we’re not having to convince people that it’s interesting, or that they should pay attention to it.”