July Archives

Thank you for the support

Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 31, 2008

Now that the Disclosure Best Practices Toolkit has been live for a few days, we can take stock and survey the landscape a little.  Feedback has generally been positive, and criticism has generally been fair.  The document will continue to evolve, and we invite everyone to post comments as well as share their own version.

We also want to take a moment and thank all the members who blogged and tweeted about the release.  Without their hard work and dedication, none of this would have happened.

We are also grateful for some terrific supporting posts and tweets from others outside the organization. Here is a sampling:

IBM combines social media and traditional media in B2B campaign

Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 31, 2008

Clickz reports that IBM is combing traditional media with a new social networking site, Voice of the Business Partner, to push a new mid-market B2B campaign. “Chris MacLaughlin, VP of marketing in the IBM Systems & Technology Group, told ClickZ IBM hopes the partners will use the Voice site to create new relationships among themselves, and to form partner networks and alliances to better deliver IBM products and services.” According to Clickz, “MacLaughlin says this is the first time that social networking has been tried within IBM’s channel community, although IBM has used online forums in the past.” Thanks to the WOMMA word.

Workforce Collaboration and Web 2.0

Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 30, 2008

Aberdeen Group has put out a new study on workforce collaboration and Web 2.0. The study focused on 270 worldwide organizations employing Web 2.0 technologies to enhance collaboration. They are reporting that “best-in-class” organizations are seeing an average of 34% reduced project time-to-completion, shortened time-to-resolution on average of 22%, improved employee productivity of 19%, and a decrease in training cost by 14%. Get the whole report.

New study: 15% of Fortune 500 is blogging

Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 30, 2008

A recent study from Burson-Marsteller reported 74 companies (nearly 15%) on the Fortune 500 are actively blogging. The majority were technology-related: computers, office equipment, network and communications, telecom, and Internet services.

The study also revealed that larger companies tend to blog in greater numbers than their smaller counterparts:

  • 32% of the Fortune 50 are blogging
  • 16% of the Fortune 201-250 are blogging
  • 2% of the Fortune 451-500 are blogging

Thanks, PR Week, for the link.

Thinking Strategically about Corporate Blogging: Guest Blogger - Michael Brito, Intel

Posted by Michael Brito on July 29, 2008

(Members of the Blog Council lead corporate blogging and social media at large corporations. We are delighted to share their thoughts on blogging from the corporate perspective. This post is the guest author’s personal opinion.)

So your boss walks into your office one morning and says, “Our competitors have blogs and now we need one too! Please get one started ASAP and let me know when it’s launched.” And then you’re left scratching your head not knowing where to start. This is a common theme in corporate America.

There are several issues that you need to think about before you “dive in” head first into corporate blogging; and this by no means is a comprehensive list:

  • Who is your target audience and do they even participate in social media?
    Forrester has published a Social Technographics Ladder of Participation that categorizes social behaviors into six key usage models – Creators, Critics, Collectors, Joiners, Spectators and Inactives. At Intel, we hired Forrester to perform a study that maps our target segments to each of the Technographics profiles; and use this data to serve as our social media strategy for all planning. I believe that a good strategy evolves from data and research; rather than taking the shotgun approach.
  • Do you have all the right people involved?
    It’s good practice to get buy in across the organization before executing on a corporate blog – legal, product development, customer support. They need to know about it; and may even use it to field customer support questions, product innovation ideas, etc.
  • Do you have a moderation policy?
    Hopefully your blog will be open for comments but how will they be approved and to what extent will you allow for “critical” comments? At Intel, we have applied a “good, bad and ugly” policy; whereby we allow for the good and bad but not the ugly. Ugly comments usually contain obscenities of some sort.
  • What’s your conversation strategy?
    I hate to use the word “editorial calendar” for blogging so I have renamed ours at Intel to “blog idea guide”. In the guide, I have listed out all the upcoming events and product launches coupled with ideas that will help guide the conversation; and this does not include white papers and press releases. It boils down to this. You are not talking to an audience, target market or consumer. You are talking to real people with real personalities, wants, desires and passions; and it’s important that you treat them that way by having real conversations with them. Show them the love and they will love you back; and tell people about it too.
  • Do you have the right people blogging?
    In my humble opinion, people relate to other people more then they can relate to corporations. It’s important that your bloggers are aware of this and understand the importance of relationships; so full disclosure and transparency from your bloggers is imperative. It’s also good practice to find those “key” individuals in your organization that are passionate about your products and services, and are enthusiastic to engage in dialogue with others.
  • Are you going to implement a community evangelist program?
    I know, it sounds pretty cool – community evangelist program – and maybe it’s not a program per se but it’s a really simple concept. Are you equipping and training your bloggers to participate in the conversations that are happening off domain. Are they on Twitter, Friendfeed, MyBlogLog, and Facebook? And, are these tools talking to each other and pulling in feeds?
  • How will you measure your blogging efforts?
    I wrote about this over a year and half ago - Measuring Social Media – but it’s still relevant today; and even though the post is about social media, many of the same metrics can be used just for blogging (i.e. comments, views, rss subscriptions, posts emailed to others, posts bookmarked, etc.) I read a report (I can’t remember the source, sorry) that said that a 1:1 ratio of posts to comments is a good benchmark for corporate blogs. While this may seem a bit low, it may be a good start.

Don’t get me wrong. Blogging is our friend. It is an effective communication channel and if it is done properly, it can produce great results for your company. But before you jump right in, hire an agency and launch it, you should consider many of the points mentioned above.

Michael Brito is …

How to make your online community succeed

Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 29, 2008

The Wall Street Journal Blog is covering Ed Moran’s study of more than 100 businesses with online communities. According to the study “Thirty-five percent of the online communities studied have less than 100 members; less than 25% have more than 1,000 members - despite the fact that close to 60% 6% of these businesses have spent over $1 Million.” Read the story on the WSJ blog.

Making Disclosure and Transparency Easier

Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 28, 2008

There is widespread agreement in the social media community that the principle of disclosure is vital to honest and open communications, and that it is necessary for businesses participating in the conversation to uphold these principles.

We believe that the first step is for companies to create a simple disclosure policy so their employees and agencies know the appropriate and transparent ways of participating.

To get things started, the Blog Council has published a do-it-yourself Disclosure Best Practices Toolkit to make it easy for companies to do the right thing.

Go to http://blogcouncil.org/disclosure and make it your own:

  • Discuss, comment, critique, contribute
  • Create your own policy
  • Share your version with the community

    We’re pleased to be able to help push the disclosure issue to the top of the agenda for businesses participating in the blogosphere, as well as the opportunity to add structure to the debate over some very complex issues.

    If these issues are important to you, please help spread the message that disclosure is never optional, but it is easy to do well.

    Legal Experts Share Policy Best Practices in PLI Briefing

    Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 25, 2008

    Yesterday, we hosted a call with the Practising Law Institute on setting employee blogger and social media policies.  Moderated by our own Andy Sernovitz, Jennifer Rappoport of Winston & Strawn and Roxane Marenberg of Cisco Systems shared the best practices and key learnings they’ve gained setting and advising on policies for blogging and social media at the corporate level.

    We periodically host calls like this with the PLI to address the legal issues associated with blogging and social media at the corporate level.  It’s a terrific deal for attorneys and counsel, as they are eligible to earn CLE credit for listening in.

    Our next call is September 18 and is entitled “Understanding Disclosure.” If you want to join us for the call, let us know.

    Special thanks to the PLI’s Anita Shapiro and Amy Taub for doing yeoman’s work behind the scenes to make this event happen.

    Companies are finding more applications for virtual worlds

    Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 25, 2008

    According to Businessweek, large corporations such as IBM, Sun Microsystems, and Cisco Systems are turning to virtual worlds like Second Life in order to move past geographic barriers and bring diverse global teams together to work collaboratively. Though still in the early stages of using virtual worlds, corporations have found Second Life and similar platforms conducive for holding meetings, conferences, and sometimes, even hiring.

    Forrester reports Web 2.0 purchasing controlled by IT

    Posted by Blog Council Staff on July 25, 2008

    According to the Forrester report, Web 2.0 purchasing decisions are controlled by the IT department and not marketing. The study reports that 59% of IT decision makers are familiar with blogs and 35% are personally using the technology. Although not all IT decision makers are completely familiar with it, 40% report that Web 2.0 will have an impact on business. Thanks Larry Dignan

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