2008 - Finally! The Year of the Business Blog
Even though there are only about 12% of the Fortune 500 businesses who are currently blogging publicly according to Socialtext, I believe we’ve finally hit the Year of the Business Blog. I’ve been waiting for it to hit since 2005, the Year of the Media Blog. Release the doves!
Over on ReadWrite Web, Marshall Kirkpatrick has published a short list of good business blogs to read, and says:
“An interesting company blog can be a great way to draw in new people through relevant content of general interest - and some of them will stay to check out the service you provide.”
I’m happy because one of my clients, Scott Niesen over at Attensa got a nod from Marshall in his list.
A good business blog will do many things for a company, including:
Establish thought leadership - if you have an interesting view of your market, a blog can help you illuminate your genius (or expose your audacity…).
Humanize your organization - sometimes it’s good to get out behind the walls of your brand and let the people of the organization have a voice. Robert Scoble humanized Microsoft to thousands of developers during his tenure as evangelist, and he did it simply by blogging his thoughts and reactions to conversations out in the open.
Building community - community is the buzzword du jour, and there’s no simpler way to build community around your product or service than to enable conversations on your site using blog software.
So what’s holding your organization back? We’ve got seven months to go in the Year of the Business Blog… the time to explore it for your business is now, and it doesn’t take long.
(I’ve got a client who contacted me on May 9 to help them decide how to build community for their organization, and we’re launching their blog - with the company fully trained and prepped with strategy, objectives and tactics defined - on June 2.)
We were at the INC 5000 meeting in Chicago in the Fall. Every speaker talked two topics. One - stop working in your business and start working on it. And two - get your company involved in the social network online. We came back and started our blog right away - www.Essentialu.typepad.com. We listened into your talk to OEN last week and I blogged about you http://essentialu.typepad.com/my_weblog/2008/05/my-grandpa-kell.html along with some other great resources.
Interesting post. I think the viability of a business blogging may hinge on that company’s confidence it can quickly and effectively execute, allowing them to take a thought leadership position when that leadership position may tip their tactical hand by blogging.
It occurs to me that individuals within companies may have fascinating, industry leading thoughts, but that they may not trust that their organization can execute on them quickly enough. Therefore they hold back (e.g. don’t blog) as it is risky to expose those thoughts as signals to the competition. For example, Afternic blogged about an upcoming feature, something they had better deliver quickly, otherwise they will lose the edge.
If my rambling is valid, another way to look at your statistic could be that the 12% of the Fortune 500 have their strategic and execution act together, and 88% do not.
(Fixed post) - Using blogs to spur product innovation from Forrester (note: found via Twitter): Build your own “IdeaStorm” with UserVoice
Hi Kayla,
Thanks so much for the link, and the listen. I’m grateful to hear you found the information useful, and that you’re blogging for business. Keep me posted as to your rewards - you’re certainly starting out using the right protocol - commenting and tracking back is (almost) more important than writing posts!
Craig,
As always, you add such value here. When are you going to start blogging on your own? You’re a natural.
I’ve run into many business managers who simply fear the commitment and finality of a blog. I’ve now seen Zappos successfully move onto Twitter and wonder if more C-level execs will do that in lieu of taking the time to create and maintain a blog…it is certainly less commitment.
Well, that’d be a twist! I wonder… it’s certainly be cool if they did. Fewer options for “ghostwritten” tweets, too!
I love that idea, but am prompted to ask how old the Zappos guys are - I read somewhere the other day that the avg. age of a C-level is 51 or 52, and frankly, I’d be very surprised if most of those my age (51) would take the time to learn to communicate that way… although… wait a second!
Their emails are often more like tweets than tomes…