Companies and their blogs
Just read this article discussing companies and their blogs:
“It’s become an expectation that if you have a business, you have a blog,” said John Jantsch, a Kansas City marketing coach and active blogger for several years. “Consumers are looking to find a community around your service. They’re looking to have conversations with companies about the products they’re using.”
Here we go: No. A blog is not just another PR channel such as television, radio, or print… a blog is a form of interactive media to allow conversation and encourage community. For big companies to have company-sanctioned blogs that have posts that are first reviewed by the company’s legal department, then by the public relations department, then by the Don’t Offend Anybody department… wake up! You are not writing a blog! It may have the CEO’s face next to the post, it may be open for comments, but unless the CEO wrote it his- or herself and is responding to those comments, unless the blog represents an open and honest line of communication between the author and the readers, then it is not “real” blogging (yeah, as if I know!).
Designate someone in the company to be the blogger, be the forum moderator, whatever, but then leave them alone. My favorite example of this kind of person is Walter, the mod for the Northwoods GoDiagram forums. This dude answers every technical question well in a friendly manner and has saved the bacon of many, many GoDiagram developers. He is an invaluable resource and, best of all, he’s a person, he’s out there, he takes risks, and, yes, he represents the company in these one-on-one conversations with the company’s customers. That informal support relationship shouldn’t be capitalized by the company in any formal pricing structure (“3 conversations with Walter for $9.95 per month!”) it should be left the hell alone.
I think service-oriented doesn’t just mean having WSDLs and REST architectures… it means creating and sustaining a community where the total is greater than the sum of the parts.