The Good, The Blog & The Ugly: Make Your Business Blog a Success
July 29, 2008
Blogging started off as a fun way to share about yourself and showcase your personal passions. Now it is becoming more common to use blogs as tool in business to further your marketing or public relations strategy. There are ways to do this well and there are certainly pitfalls to avoid when using Blogs.
This article will show you how to do that so you can make sure your Blog is one of the Good ones, not one of the ‘Ugly’ or downright commercially dangerous ones.
Principle 1: Blog Responsibly
Be careful that employees don’t reveal sensitive company information on your blog. You don’t want one of your employees blogging about an upcoming marketing strategy to one of your competitors. This could spell disaster for your business.
Principle 2: Know thyself and thy blogging
Once upon a time, blogs were like online diaries with notes, entries, comments and questions. These days there are some groundbreaking blogs out there using very innovative multi-media strategies. As well as knowing your own strengths and weaknesses, stay in tune with what other people are doing and incorporate some new ideas into your own blogging.
(General Motors’ blog is a great example: http://fastlane.gmblogs.com/).
Principle 3: Know thy enemy blogger
Knowing your own abilities, limitations and the available technology is good, but not good enough. You need to also know who you’re competing with. You should therefore follow the advice of Cory Miller when he suggests that we “study the great blogs and learn what makes them great.” By studying successful competitor blogs, we learn why they are successful, how we can adopt their strategy and how to improve upon it, thus drawing more attention to ourselves. It’s dog eats dog out there, or rather, blog eat blog.
Principle 4: Blog effectively
Get clear on when a blogging strategy is effective and when it is not the most optimal approach. Thomas Nelson Publishing recommends that employees host company blogs themselves rather than hosting at the company level. This strategy creates separation between the company and individual blogs. However, especially in a smaller workplace, it may be better to allow employees to blog directly on the company site as it projects more of a ‘family feel’. In this instance, employee education as to what is and isn’t appropriate would be a necessity.
Principle 5: Blog with Vision
Keep your eyes on the broader picture when blogging. Where is blogging heading? What are the future trends? How can your business take advantage of them? When you do this and implement new strategies, you can be leader not a follower in the world of blogging.
Principle 6: Blog with Depth
The 6th principle is to blog with depth. This means to blog with your marketing strategy and purpose firmly in mind. Remember, a blog is there to serve your marketing and overall business strategy and is only a tool to do that- it is not an end in itself. When you look at it from this perspective you will know what to do, what not do, and what to definitely avoid.
Principle 7: Keep note of blogging details
The more attention you pay to what is happening on your blog, the more effective it will be. It’s just like a pot plant - the more energy and attention you give it, the better it will grow.
Principle 8: Avoid blog overuse
Don’t’ blog just for the sake of it. Make sure you are blogging with purpose and in conjunction with other effective marketing strategies. Remember, there are a host of other internet marketing strategies that are equally effective and can be used in conjunction with blogging. Explore them all and create a multi faceted strategy that clearly makes your company the preeminent force in your field.
The main trick to successful blogging is to understand what is happening in the world of blogging, what you think is going to happen and also to use your blog carefully so as to avoid any negative outcomes. Following the 8 Principles will help to ensure your blogging is successful.
If you’re thinking about starting an external blog for your company, you might want to lay down a few rules for employees regarding safe blogging, since it can be read by anyone. Examples range from avoiding slander to divulging sensitive company secrets and product information.
Many people set up their blog with a free blogging service such as www.blogger.com. I suggest that you use your own domain to operate your blog using Wordpress or Movable Type. This gives you much more power and flexibility when creating your blog.
http://www.wordpress.org http://www.movabletype.org/
Both these services provide an abundance of help and support materials. You’ll be a successful blogger before you know it!
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