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With the proliferation of Web 2.0 tools, corporate blogging has gained a lot of prominence in the past few years. Sun Microsystems, with a nearly 4,000 employee-strong blog network, is an excellent example of this trend. Enterprises have started acknowledging blogging as a positive marketing tool that, besides raising the company's visibility, also helps in highlighting organizations' freedom of expression. Since corporate blogging can help in increasing a firm's transparency in the market, strategists believe that companies should encourage their employees to blog; however, they should set certain peripheries that should encourage safe and healthy blogging behavior.
However, all the positives of corporate blogging come with a caveat. Although corporate blogging has a lot to add to a firm's image, an employee's wrong take on corporate life can ruin the entire initiative. Since blogs allow a company to go public, certain actions by employees can hamper a firm's image in the public domain. An example of this would be when an employee makes unintentional disclosures about his/her company's sensitive information, or when he/she gets carried away and makes certain offensive remarks; such instances can be extremely detrimental to the reputation of an organization. Strategists believe that employees need to be disciplined in their approach toward corporate blogging.
We believe that with more and more companies encouraging corporate blogging, it is of utmost importance to set down certain rules and guidelines regarding blogging behavior. Analysts are of the opinion that company managements should define some broad parameters, which besides serving as a means of controlling blogging, will also help in prevent embarrassing situations for firms. Although corporate blogging frameworks/policies are the need of the hour, these should not be made too strict, leading company blogs to lose the human conversational style. Some examples of companies adopting and implementing excellent blogging practices include eminent names such as Google, Yahoo, IBM, Adobe, Sun Microsystems, etc....
Experts have suggested certain pointers that can help in keeping a check on this online dialogue, as well as help in imposing some restrictions on employees' weblog conduct. They suggest that nothing should be posted on the blog that opposes a company's brand image and violates the privacy of other employees, such as the higher management, business partners, and also a firm's customers. The employees should also make sure that their blog post should not contain any sort of confidential information. Moreover, due importance should be paid to the fact that any 'about to be launched' product information is not made publicly available on company blogs. Strategists suggest that employees should also refrain from comparing a firm with its competitors. Employees should also desist from posting bad remarks about any company.
In addition to all of the above dos and don'ts, another instruction that companies must emphasize to employees is that they would be held personally responsible for any content that is posted on the blogs. Moreover, companies have started following a practice wherein they attach a disclaimer with the blog stating that the views expressed are entirely personal and not representative of a company's opinion. All these moves can help the organization in promoting healthy corporate blogging practices. A step toward inculcating good corporate blogging practices was taken in 2007 with the setting up of the Blog Council. An initiative of large corporations such as Nokia, Microsoft, General Motors, The Coca-Cola Company, Cisco Systems, and Dell, to name a few, the council's aim is to develop best standards for corporate blogs.
On the whole, notwithstanding the fact that corporate blogging provides a good marketing platform to companies, we believe that to make it a success, companies need to put in a lot of effort as this medium requires a lot of time, resources, and, most importantly, commitment to transparency.
Corporate blogs have increased in influence as well as importance over the past few years. Generally, corporate blogs are categorized into three broad types, namely, internal, external, and CEO blogs.
Enterprises are increasingly promoting corporate blogging owing to its benefits such as building strong communities, brand awareness, and transparency. The Blog Council was formed in 2007 by a few large organizations such as Nokia, Motorola, Cisco, and Dell, among others, to promote this medium and to promote best practices for corporate blogging.
Some of the challenges being encountered in promoting corporate blogging include managing the blog, continuously updating it, maintaining the reputation of the organization on the blog, etc....
Our partners at Analysts Perspectives present an overview of the ongoing trends in corporate blogging, based on analyst observations, opinions, and predictions.
Some key findings include the idea that 2008 is expected to be a breakthrough year for corporate blogging; with online content technologies rapidly overtaking traditional ones, corporate blogging is set to triple over in 2008; and by 2009, corporate blogging is expected to be as much of a standard tool in a marketer's kit as email is today.
This is an effective way to drive organic traffic to your site, which creates opportunities to grow your sales conversions and, ultimately, a bigger customer base. Consider that 70 to 80 percent of blog traffic comes from new visitors.