Archive of tag "business blogging"
A recent study by HubSpot using data from their 1,531 customers (comprised of both small and medium-sized businesses) found that companies that blogged had far better marketing results.
Results from the sampling — which split almost evenly among those that blogged and those that didn’t — showed that companies that were blogging saw 55% more visitors, 97% more inbound links, and 434% more indexed pages.
Borrowing from the world of Stephen Covey, Mario Sundar of LinkedIn moderated a panel on the “seven habits of highly effective business bloggers” last month at BlogWorld Expo. The panel included Blog Council member Lionel Menchaca of Dell, Nicki Dugan of Yahoo!, Carolyn Abram of Facebook, and Tom Hoehn of Kodak.
1. Status: It’s a relationship and it’s complicated
Start a corporate blog only if you’re in it for the long haul. Every panelist described the genesis of their respective blog, it’s origins, and most importantly how the blog impacted the company’s relationship with the users. I also got them talking about some of the challenges and pitfalls associated with it.
2. Tell Honest, Current Stories
As Jack Welch described the one rule of corporate blogging: “Just be Authentic“. The only way to build credibility with your users is by toning down the PR speak and amping up the straight talk. We also went over some of the privacy issues that one has to deal with while running a company blog.
3. Know your limits
Another area that you must keep in mind (this is relevant more for Fortune 500 than Inc 500 companies) are the legal landmines you have to navigate. But remember, your legal team is there to help you. So, having them support you a 100% right from the start and drafting best practices is key to ensure success.
4. Make lemonade
Social Media jujitsu is what we called it (thanks to Groundswell for the inspiration). How do you take a seemingly negative situation – irate users; and turn that over to a positive. Nicki, Carolyn and Lionel shared some pretty inspirational stories that ranged from the Facebook News feed to Yahoo! TV. Key here is putting your users first and listening to them.
5. One size doesn’t fit all
As I’ve often said before; do not start a corporate blog unless you have a goal in mind. Given that different companies start a corporate blog for different purposes – some may use it to educate their users while some others for recruitment. Thus best practices are also going to vary from one example to the other.
The panelists got into a spirited discussion of whether comments are necessary for a blog and under what conditions. Does your company have a corporate blog? And, if so, do you allow comments? Feel free to share.
6. Learn as you go
On short notice, I threw out a question to the panel on the biggest lesson learned during their stewardship of their respective company blogs. Of course, they were all able to effortlessly answer the questions with many of their answers highlighting the improvisational nature of the job.
7. It’s not just words
And, finally a glimpse into the future. Ideas shared focused on the multimedia nature of the future. As you may notice many corporate blogs are increasingly stepping into social media (which by definition includes pictures – Flickr, video – YouTube, and the likes). What do you think does the future of corporate blogging hold?
Have you ever wondered about the real people who run the biggest corporate blogs? This week, we’re sitting down with them to get their thoughts about the broader issues and landscape of social media at the corporate level.
John Andrews, Senior Marketing Manager for Emerging Media for Walmart
Suraya Bliss, Senior Director of Associate Communications for Walmart
Describe the key social media efforts at Walmart
At Walmart, our goal for social media is simple. Engage consumers around their passion points using saving money, easy shopping and quality products as a filter. With more than 140 million people coming through our doors each week, this extends far beyond the internet to mobile, the Smart Network our in-store interactive platform and virtually anywhere that our customer would like to interact with us. Along with our customers, we are also finding new ways to connect with our more than 1.4 million associates about the issues they care about through the channels they want to use.
How would you summarize your roles?
To connect and serve as interface between customers and our marketing, PR, information systems, walmart.com, samsclub.com, the corporate intranet, and operations communities to help provide customers and associates better experiences at every touchpoint.
What do you love most about your jobs?
Working with teams across the company that believe in the power of new media and who are willing to do what it takes to bring ideas to life.
What is the biggest challenge you face with social media?
With 1.4 million associates and 200 million million customers in the US alone, it can be difficult to align goals and projects.
What advice do you have for marketers just beginning to utilize social media?
1. Hurry up.
2. Be willing to take risks and be willing to make mistakes.
3. Don’t think you can control the medium; your job is to leverage it.
What are your three favorite blogs?
From John:
Occam’s Razor (Avinash Kaushik)
Groundswell (Josh Bernoff)
Web-Strategist (Jeremiah Owyang)
Meet John and Suraya at BlogWell on October 28 in San Jose, where they will be presenting a case study on social media at Walmart entitled “Connect and Share with 200 Million of Your Closest Friends.”
Get practical, how-to advice, a lesson in disclosure and corporate social media responsibility, and loads of ideas and examples – all for $200.
BlogWell is presented by GasPedal and the Blog Council.
Reem Abeidoh recently compiled a list of 13 steps Fortune 500 companies could take to create a blog. Several Blog Council members were interviewed for the article, including Intel (Michael Brito), Cisco (LaSandra Brill,) along with noted expert Tac Anderson of Hewlett Packard.
Click to read the entire article…
The Social Media Business Council, formerly the Blog Council, is a brands-only community that helps large organizations build successful social media programs.
Word of Mouth Marketing:
Clorox: Using gaming strategies to grow community
BlogWell: How big brands use social media