Blog Data

Blog Stats from Jeremy Teetor

Blog as Administrative Tool

• Management can use to communicate with staff
• Reduces face-to-face meetings and memos 

• Maintains permanent archive of all policy/procedure updates 

• Can substitute bulky training manuals

• Quickly access specific information
• tagging
• searching
• Review from anywhere with internet 
• Reduces training time during office hours

• Reduces printing costs 
• Less clutter from printed manuals 

• Keep in control of senior administrator to ensure continuity

Blog as a Marketing Tool

• Can increase web presence
• Corporate Website + Blog= multiple search engine hits

• Effective in promoting changes or new merchandise 

• Notified of blog updates through RSS Feed
• Harder to monitor generic websites this way

• Readers are able to interact and critique potentially new products
• Makes customers feel engaged 
• Creates sense of customer ownership 

• Must monitor for controversial public content

History Of Blogs

· Blogs- next logical creation after the advent of the Internet. Desire for more interaction.

· A by-product of the online diary. Justin Hall began personal “blogging” in 1994 while a student at Swarthmore College- considered one of the earliest authors of this medium.

· “Weblog” was created by Jorn Barger in 1997. Short form “blog” created by Peter Merholz  in 1999 on his blog www.peterme.com .  That same year www.pitas.com, the first free build-your-own-weblog tool launched- number of blogs significantly increased. 

· Open Diary launched October 1998, which soon grew to thousands of diaries. Innovated the reader comment, becoming the first blog community where readers could add comments to other writers' blog entries. http://www.opendiary.com/

· Original blogs were link-driven sites. Blogs only created by people who already knew how to make a website and write in HTML code. This blog was created by using www.blogspot.com.

· As of February 2011 – Over 156 million blogs. Blogs now impact everything from one’s personal life, to the corporate world, to global society at large

What Is A Blog?

How Would Hamlet Manage?

Posted on August 21, 2012 | Leave a comment

To be a good manager or not to be. That is the question.
Of course, if you manage people, you think you are the best manager ever. You right all the wrongs of previous managers you had that you hated and you take the best of the ones you love and you get the perfect combination right? Wrong!!
The HR performance management course challenged me to think much
broader than that. It made me see managing people is part of a bigger
process that must have a defined structure and expectations for all
parties involved. You have to maintain an open mind when dealing with
issues and you have to truly understand what motivates individuals and
what some basic steps are you can miss in setting up the process that
can make for a much less meaningful employee/employer relationship.
This class challenged me to be a better manager and surprisingly, a
better employee. If you want to discover a more structured approach on
how to manage the entire performance management process or to use as a
guide to managing your own career-this class is for you!

WHAT IS A BLOG?

• A discussion or informational site consisting of “posts” typically in reverse chronological order. Interactive, allowing readers to leave comments.

• Can be either single subject themed  with one author http://www.lifetreasured.blogspot.com/ 

• Or “multi-author blogs” (MAB) with multiple subjects, numerous authors, professionally edited. Usually maintained by larger groups or businesses http://www.indyweek.com/indyweek/ArticleArchives?category=1279126. http://blogs.starbucks.com/blogs/.

“It began with conversations. Then we got into broadcast media. Now we are going back to conversations. It’s a full circle” (Terry Catchpole, Catchpole Corporation)

Most blogs are:

Commentary

Personal

Advertising –Conversational marketing

Most blogs contain:

Text

Photos

Videos

Audio 

Blogs can be the perfect form of communication to bring multiple players together; customers, partners, vendors, investors, media at large.

“The Internet has been, in effect, pre-surfed” by way of blogs

Blogging as an Effective Communications Tool

Using a blog gives companies a voice and communication venue that they normally wouldn't have.

Some benefits of business blogging include:

• It allows a company to be where modern consumers are - Online.
• It makes the consumer feel like they have genuine information they can use to make decisions, It's building a relationship with the brand and with the product. (1)
• For (larger) companies like Macy's and Wal-Mart to have a true dialogue with their best customers, and, most importantly, provides high-value customers a platform to evangelize a brand. (2)
• Provides an excellent forum for reaching a highly-targeted audience.
• Provides a place for content specific information to reside in a central place.
• Blogs are different than company websites and are much more dynamic.  Especially in the ability to offer two-way communication.
• Online community for specific people, groups, or interests.
• Allows for visual aids like pictures or videos while sharing information in an easy to consume format.
• Blogs allow a company to present a Personal Touch and their own Voice to consumers.
• Real-time, Instant Communication.
• Control release of information.
• Allows for social networking.

(1)“Honda uses Insight blog to build buzz, shape message”  Webb, Alysha = Automotive News, Vol. 83, Issue 6351, Date 3/16/09

(2)Magazine =Women’s Wear Daily (WWD) “Social Media Issue: Does it Drive Sales?” Strugatz, Rachel, Pg. 1 Vol. 204 No. 47 ISSN: 0149-5380

Examples and Types of Business Blogging

As a business, there are two major strategies that are best suited for a blog format.

• Cultivating a voice for your business and consumers
• Establishing a broadcasting place to message and have a two-way conservation

Both must create a relationships that “gives value to the consumer, rather than push out” your own business agenda.(1) Due to the open format, ease of use, and low barriers to entry; a blog is a great way to open communication for a business in almost any industry.

Enterprise  Blog: 

Many companies use a blog within their own company to help inform their employees and partners.  The company can “share knowledge freely…to explain company strategies, new products, and business processes.”  This helps build “ a new, trust-based corporate culture.”  Also, you can create “wealth of personal connections that now lie within the enterprise”

“Social Distance”, Orr, Bill  ABA Banking Journal; Oct2004, Vol. 96 Issue 10, p106-110, 2p

• IBM: http://www.ibm.com/blogs/zz/en/

“We’re very much a knowledge-based company. It’s really the expertise of the employee that we’re hitting on.”

Adam Christensen, social media communications at IBM Corporation

Large Scale Business Blogging:

• Google: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/
• Disney parks: http://disneyparks.disney.go.com/blog/

Disney Parks is a site designed to encourage more visitors to Disney’s parks. They do a fantastic job of making their site memorable and useful.

socialmediaexaminer.com

Targeting your Market:

• Citrix (Professionals): http://workshifting.com/

Citrix’s unique blogging strategy is all about adding value. Their blog, Work Shifting, is a work/lifestyle blog that focuses on the issues people in business experience when on the move. What’s interesting is that you have to really look hard to know which company is behind the blog because Citrix downplays their involvement. Instead, they’ve put their audience’s needs first and have created a space that resonates with their audience’s needs and interests.

socialmediaexaminer.com

• SilkRoad (HR): http://blog.silkroad.com/

Blogging as a Business (or as a major part of the model):

• Pioneer Woman: http://thepioneerwoman.com/

Pioneer Woman is an excellent example of a successful lifestyle blog. The blog’s creator, Ree Drummond, has used her blog as a platform for a variety of projects, including promoting her cookbook and showcasing her photography. Her “secret sauce” lies in her ability to connect personally with her readers while creating a welcoming, friendly and warm experience one blog post at a time

socialmediaexaminer.com

(1) Magazine: Women’s Wear Daily (WWD) Untangling the Web Of Social Media’s Second Generation?” Strugatz, Rachel,  6/8/11 Pg. 1 Vol. 201 No. 117 ISSN: 0149-5380