Posted by Joe Panettieri
During a recent marketing summit hosted by Cisco in Miami, I was inundated with questions about corporate blogging. How do you set one up? What are some common mistakes to avoid? Who from within a business should write for the corporate blog? There were plenty of valid questions.
Books like “Strategies and Tools for Corporate Blogging” (by John Cass) provide several tips for aspiring corporate bloggers. But reading a book on blogging is like scanning a driver’s manual. Ultimately, you need to get behind the wheel and practice. So too with corporate blogging. Here are five steps to getting started, based on my own experience:
1. Launch a Private Blog: Blogging platforms like WordPress (which we use at Microcast) allow you to write a blog that only invited users can see. Use this “private” approach for several months to develop your voice and writing style. You’ll also learn if you have the energy, focus and desire to blog frequently. Fact is, you can’t fake blogging. You’re either going to get addicted to it — or you’ll consider it a painful, demanding addition to your workload.
2. Stay Frequent: There’s nothing worse than a corporate blog that never gets updated. It’s like an empty billboard that shows you have nothing of value to say. Be sure to update the blog at least once per week. Even here at Microcast, we’ve failed to follow this advice because we’re busy building out three new blog platforms that will launch in early 2008. But we’ll get far more vocal here once those projects are completed.
3. Be Honest: Corporate blogs often get bogged down in corporate speak. Even worse, they look like they’ve been polished by the PR and marketing teams. A case in point: Check out this corporate blog at Symantec, featuring a dialog between Senior VP Art Wong and CTO Mark Bergman, two sharp guys talking about software as a service. You’d expect to get some great insights. Instead, we get exchanges like this:
- Art: We’ve launched Online Backup Service into beta already.
- Mark: That’s exciting! Can you tell us when that is going to be available as a real service and when you expect some of the other services to roll out?
Are we to believe that Mark — the CTO of Symantec — didn’t know his company had launched an online backup service? Better yet, he writes with exclamation points! Sorry, but senior executives at major software companies don’t write, talk or blog this way. You’ve got to use your real voice online — otherwise readers will dismiss you as a marketing mouthpiece.
4. Be Interactive: Blogs provide a way for readers to interact with you. You’ve got to welcome — rather than fear — reader “comments.” Avoid the temptation to turn off a blog’s comment features. Also, don’t force readers to “register” before they post a comment. Instead, let them share their thoughts — good and bad — about your blog posts and your business. This will drive incredible learning within your company.
Skeptical? Check out Direct2Dell, one of my favorite corporate blogs. It’s filled with thousands of reader comments — some positive, many negative. Dell’s PR, marketing and technology executives often reply to the comments. Many reader comments help drive Dell’s own product development. The key takeaway: Corporate blogs are about outward communication and inward communication. Accept it or don’t launch a blog.
5. Be Focused: Pick a topic and drive it home. Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz frequently writes about customer focus and open source. He comes across as an approachable, innovative executive who is open to new ideas. You can’t be all things to all people with a blog. Pick a few topics that are near-and-dear to your company’s focus, and blog about them at least once or twice per week.
Still not sure where to start? Send me an email (joe [at] microcast.biz). We’re helping several clients to launch and polish their corporate blogs — even as we continue to build new editorial blogs of our own.
