Why Create A Business Blog?

Many business organizations have embraced web logs or ‘blogs’ as the future in communication. In fact, a recent article in Business Week magazine calls blogging a: “prerequisite” for business. That same article declares that blogs are: “simply the most explosive outbreak in the information world since the Internet itself”. Living in the ‘Information Age’ what business wouldn’t be influenced by incorrect, stifled, or a complete lack of information? Blogs are the new conduit for business information for both internal and external use. Blogs are available 100% free, password protected, with no banners or ads. A selection of simple pre-created formats and easy control programs allow anyone to start a blog with little to no technical knowledge. With such accessibility, blogs stand out as the alternative to an expensive web site with a greater degree of marketing ability.

Business growth is a common result of blogging since they are a flexible, pliable form of communication that generates information in a timeline manner. Keeping to the true ‘blog form’ is the key to gaining so much information. Blogs are successful because of their basic format that produces a free exchange of information between the posting parties and the commenting parties. The exchange can seem overwhelming at first but many find a blog much more organized than e-mail and less rigid than a newsletter or web site. Blogs have also grown in popularity due to the large variety of uses for the web-based media.

Corporate Blogging

Sending Information Out

Blogs were originally designed to publish. At the very least a blog publishes the company’s name onto the Internet. A blog can even stand in for a full-featured company web site. However, instead of calling up the web site designer to add new content the CEO or operations manager can simply address the audience of consumers or distributors himself by posting a direct message. The blog can easily take on the task of a daily or weekly newsletter to customers updating them on changes within the company, the start of new pricing, or the development of new products. This would help eliminate the incessant requests for information by e-mail or phone call.

A company blog can also act as a media resource where information for the press is published. This keeps reporters from calling every company phone line as they try to get a quotable statement. Should a rumor get started in the general media, the company blog would be a great place to confirm or debunk any allegations. Not to mention, sharing the company’s expert opinion on the future of business, economics, and life in general gives the public sense of getting to know the company. Building a good relationship with customers is one of the keys to having a successful business.

Getting Information In

Instead of just informing current or potential customers, the blog could also be a great resource for gathering information from the viewing public. This depends on keeping the commenting function operational, which might require monitoring should a business be concerned about off-topic comments and the like. However, putting that speed bump aside, blogs create great question/answer formats. This format is also a two way street.

Instead of the corporation posting a question to the public about its product they can address comments from the public. A corporation could quickly learn if a particular complaint is popular among customers depending on how many others respond to the same comment. This allows the engineers or the operations department to quickly focus on the serious flaws in the product or service. Once a solution has been found the PR manager or CEO could report the progress to the public. Hugh Macleod, authoring the blog Gapingvoid, not only manages a high quality tailoring company in the United Kingdom, but is also a self-proclaimed ‘blogvertising’ consultant. He has gone so far as to draw a diagram about this phenomenon of corporate input and output through blogging. His post titled “The Porous Membrane: Why Corporate Blogging Works” highlights his numbered theory on how eliminating membranes between the corporation and the consumers can be done with a blog.

The budding progress report that can start over these types of blogs can give the commenting customers a sense of importance. They will start to think of the company as friend instead of a heartless organization that only sees dollar signs. That’s when the best kind of input rolls in. Testimonials can give a company a big boost in drawing in new clients. It’s a known fact that people trust the opinions of other average people. When the public is happy they will be publishing comments that thank the company for addressing the problem, for making it easier, or for acting quickly. Don’t think that people won’t bother to make those statements. There are crazier ideas in this world than that of happy replies from customers who didn’t have to fill out a ‘1 through 5’ form or buy a postage stamp.

Internal Information

Blogs don’t have to be public for a business to make good use of them. Internal blogs are catching on in a big way. Shel Holtz, a principal of Holtz Communication + Technology which focuses on helping organizations apply online communication capabilities, writes on Webpronews.com that: “the opportunities for blogs internally are huge, mostly (but not exclusively) as an enhancement to knowledge sharing”. He insists that communication over projects can be greatly improved by blogs. An internal project blog would allow people in different departments to communicate without the confusing clatter of incessant e-mails cluttering up inboxes. Did she get copied on that? Did he get the memo? These questions can easily be erased with ONE bulletin board-like blog where everyone can post a memo, an update, or a question. It couldn’t get any better when the operations manager is able to just turn to that same blog and see a mock report on how everything is coming along with the project. The larger the corporation, the more this internal blog system provides a needed service for large projects.

This same idea can be used for general internal corporate communication. Company newsletters, general memos for everyone, and dare I say inspiration could be published on an internal blog that the entire workforce has access to. Again, this eliminates the plague of e-mails that suck the life out of employees and eat up the workday. Already many CEOs and company presidents are catching on like Intel's Paul Otellini, who believes his blog is a great vehicle for communicating with his employees. He enjoys that the commenting creates a dialog with all of the employees. Not only does he learn from them and vice versa, he can keep everyone on the same page with where the company is heading.

Executive Blogging

Internal blogging is one avenue for executives who use blogs, but many are trying their hand at public blogs. Just this past May, the BBC News Network asked the question: “Can Bosses Blog?”. Bob Lutz, vice president of General Motors; Randy Baseler, vice president of Boeing's commercial aircraft division; Jonathan Schwartz, president of Sun Microsystems were just some of the executives mentioned in this article. With blogs normally being the medium for straight talking, the BBC wondered whether or not blogs were executive-friendly. However, score one for the executives who spoke frankly, sometimes very frankly like this post from Rich Marcello, one of Hewlett Packard's vice presidents:

“When in your life did you stop singing? When in your life did you stop dancing? When in your life did you stop being fascinated by stories, especially your own life story? And when did you stop being comfortable with the sweet territory of silence? Food for thought. Rich.”

Rich is known for these off-the-cuff daydreams and deep thoughts next to posts on topics like the last business quarter, containing such technical jargon as “BCS had an excellent Q2”. Being both an executive and a regular guy while posting makes him an engaging author and a great face for the company.

This isn’t always a win-win situation if the executives don’t tell it like it is. Bob Lutz spoke very frankly about his optimism for the new Buick Lacrosse but by not tackling the serious issue of closing factories has made him loose credibility with readers, the BBC reports. If the public doesn’t believe you then they aren’t going to read you. However, even if a company is struggling a good executive blog can help.

Jonathan Schwartz is confident that is blog has made a positive influence on himself and Sun Microsystems. In August 2004 he told Business Week that he knew his blog was being successful when he saw comments from people with ‘@dell.com’ and ‘@ibm.com’ e-mail addresses. His salesmen also reported an increase in business from customers who viewed the company blog he authors. Though Sun Microsystems has been ailing against competitors Schwartz remains optimistic stating: “There's a free market of ideas out there, and I'd rather be driving the dialogue than be run over by it.”

Employee Blogging

An informal version of the executive blog is the employee blog. Employees have been the ones to operate public company blogs from time to time but most employee blogs are unofficial. Contrary to executive blogs, employee blogs have notoriously led to the author’s downfall. Companies appear very concerned over what their employees might be saying on their blogs. Russell Buckley, a leading practitioner, speaker and commentator on mobile marketing who authors The Mobile Technology Weblog says that, “if you're worried about what employees might write about you, you've got some pretty fundamental problems in the company.”

However, secret company projects, mergers, and just plain griping can’t be avoided sometimes and could easily be published by an employee for competitors and customers to view. Yahoo has gone as far as to have their friendly unofficial-but-official blogger Jeremy Zawodney publish the “Yahoo! Employee Blog Guidelines: The official version and my own advice” in order to have some measure of control over their employees’ blogs. However, Yahoo encourages blogging in the hopes that the blogs generated by their employees will produce more buzz over their expanding web portal.

For those companies that aren’t as web savvy, Blogger.com has tenderly produced some general guidelines: “How Not to Get Fired Because of Your Blog”. This article was created in response to the publicized firing of Michael Hanscom from Microsoft in October of 2003.

To make a long story short:

Michael was working as a contract worker for Microsoft’s print shop and happened upon a shipment of Apple computers being delivered to someone on the Microsoft campus. He couldn’t resist snapping a shot and posting it on his blog along with the phrase: “It looks like somebody over in Microsoft land is getting some new toys”.

The next Monday he was canned and Blogger.com realized that many of its clients could fall into the same pit. The author of Blogger.com’s public blog The Buzz is a young, excited employee by the name of Biz Stone. However, Biz’s posts are strickly about Blogger.com or it’s many many blogging clients.

If an employee does get into trouble for a blog their best bet would be to read some of the labor laws that could apply to blogging. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has a thorough list on it’s web site of all the laws that might protect bloggers who receive negative attention at work because of what they post on their personal blogs.

Employees who blog should either blog solely about and for their company or not at all since mixing work and personal blogging seems unadviseable.

Small Business Blogging

Small and new businesses are really just tiny corporations. Corporations have all the above reasons to create a company blog, and so do the small ‘Mom and Pop’ businesses not to mention the self-employed. With no price tag on this great media device, any starting-out business owner can create a blog and start talking about business trends or company changes instantly. A small business blog can be as diverse or as simple as the business it represents.

For a small business, blog posts become a timeline to show the direction and stability of the business. This can come in handy for the owner since it can produce an annual report on how the business is growing. An example would be if reading and commenting slowed in the 3rd quarter then the change that took place during that time could be affecting the success of the business. If the volume of visitors and commentators have only increased since the start of the blog then obviously the business is worth holding onto. The feedback could also provide a psychological boost to the struggling self-starter who is in doubt of continuing the business.

Promoting Blogs

For the self-employed the promoting blog has become a common tool. I am even pulling in my once personal blog to be my official business mouthpiece. Ana Marie Cox succeeded in promoting herself with her blog Wonkette, which got her the job of covering the National Democratic Convention for MTV. Her story of self-promotion is highlighted at Hotjobs.com as advice for the career minded.

More and more writers are promoting their manuscript through blogging. Blogger.com has already had a few success stories, which prompted the creation of another advice article called “How To Get A Book Deal With Your Blog”. In this article we learn about Wil Wheaton who scored a three-book deal with the publishing company O’Reilly with the help of his blog. Even Blogger.com’s Biz Stone has gotten a publishing deal for a book on blogging.

When you blog about a subject you can easily sound like an expert if you project confidence. When my blog was personal and dedicated to literary writing, I was constantly discussing topics for novelists like dealing with writer’s block. Many of my new visitors who read my posts for the first time thought I was already published! I was in essence self-promoting myself through my blog and I didn’t even know it.

Profile of a Business Blog

One word: PASSION

Business blogs seem to possess certain characteristics in order to be successful. Blogs have grown in popularity because they are a unique form of communication. Blogs are public but not formal, they are factual and opinionated, they are never stagnate, and always passionate. Earlier, I mentioned that I was taken for a published author while blogging about fiction writing because I was passionate about the art of writing. Having passion for the topic is the root characteristic of all blogs and what makes them so engaging.

Passion makes people want to spread the word about something and inform people. A great business blog will not only be passionate about its product or service but it will also provide relevant information on that topic. Accountants who have their own blog have been known to provide financial calculators or links to articles that explain how to make informed financial decisions. Wouldn’t it be nice if a manufacturer’s blog provided a link to the scientific study backing the creation of its new product?

With passion people also become opinionated. The author of a business blog should be able to form a concrete opinion about trade developments, new products, or the economics that shape his or her business. Relaying this information to the public helps them form an opinion about the beating heart of the business and build that all-important customer relationship. Adding a fluent educated opinion to turns the business blog into an engaging seminar instead of a flat business news report.

Complete with constant updating, passion can carry a business professional through business blogging without ever needing to read a how-to-blog-successfully article.

The Add-ons

There are two common devices business professionals can add to their company blogs besides the common Commenting function. Both these devices add to the instant sharing of information, which is the main principal of blogs.

To allow the business professional to know if his or her blog is being accessed a simple traffic analysis/statistic device called a “Hit Counter” can be implemented. Many counter services are available on the web and can count everything from blog visitors to how many times a particular link was accessed. Amazing Counters.com offers these simple devices for free with 350 different designs and web site statistics available daily or weekly. With this information a business professional will know if people are finding the blog and accessing any information. If one particular link is very popular a business blog could gain more traffic if more similar links are created. A visible hit counter on the blog itself shows new guests how many others have visited this blog and gives the reader a sense of popularity.

To allow the public to know exactly when updates are made to your blog a simple syndication system called RSS can be created. RSS or Really Simple Syndication, as described at XML.com: “is a format for syndicating news and the content of news-like sites… Once information about each item is in RSS format, an RSS-aware program can check the feed for changes and react to the changes in an appropriate way”. RSS-aware programs are now a hot item in new or updated web browser applications and will soon be the norm. In essence, once a change is made to your business blog the daily, weekly, or hourly scan from an RSS-aware device or a “News Aggregator” picks up the new version and brings it to the attention of person who initiated the repeating search. This device saves time for the reader who is probably easily disappointed visiting a web site or blog frequently and not finding anything new.

Conclusion

Business blogs have a lot of potential. No other form of media has the same flexible structure yet unlimited applications. Besides being free and easy to manage, blogs can be used in conjuncture with any other form of communication and with any business type. With such a variety of uses, blogs are sure to become the new busy hubs of the business world. However, many business professionals will do well to remember that blogs are only a business tool. A tool is nothing without the hand to wield it.

Sources:

http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/0,4621,316638,00.html

http://www.eff.org/bloggers/lg/faq-labor.php

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_18/b3931001_mz001.htm

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/aug2004/tc2004089_3601_tc024.htm

http://www.webpronews.com/news/ebusinessnews/wpn-45-20050517InternalUsesofBlogs.html

http://www.corporateblogging.info/

http://www.gapingvoid.com/Moveable_Type/archives/001607.html

http://smallbusinessblogging.com/

http://sbinformation.about.com/cs/ecommerce/a/bblogs.htm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4576737.stm

http://jeremy.zawodny.com/blog/archives/004725.html