Blogging for business

Blogging for business

Gautam GhoshThe Imagence Partners

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Agenda Overview of blogging and blogs Employment Scenario and branding

through blogging Tomorrow’s workforce Web 2.0 Internet Usage trends in India

The Pros and Cons of blogging Personal or Organizational – blogging Cases of organizations that blog

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Tom Peters’ Blog

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What is a blog/weblog? According to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia

A weblog (usually shortened to blog, but occasionally spelled web log) is a web-based publication consisting primarily of periodic articles (normally in reverse chronological order).

Blogs can be hosted by dedicated blog hosting services, or they can be run using blog software on regular web hosting services.

Like other media, blogs often focus on a particular subject, such as food, politics, or local news. Some blogs function as online diaries. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic.

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What does it look likeFigure from: Business Blogs: A Practical Guide

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A blog post

* Permalink: a type of URL referencing a specific information (news item, weblog post, etc.)which remains unchanged for a substantial amount of time.** Trackback: allows a reader to see the URL(s) others have written other entries that reference the post.

Figure from: Business Blogs: A Practical Guide

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What’s the noise about blogs ?

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Growing by leaps and bounds Technorati is now tracking more than 57 Million blogs. Today, the blogosphere is doubling in size approximately every

230 days. About 100,000 new weblogs were created each day, again down

slightly quarter-over-quarter but probably due in part to spam fighting efforts.

There is a strong correlation between the aging and post frequency of blogs and their authority and Technorati ranking.

The globalization of the blogosphere continues. Our data appears to show both English and Spanish languages are a more universal blog language than the other two most dominant language, Japanese and Chinese, which seem to be more regionally localized.

Coincident with a rise in blog posts about escalating Middle East tensions throughout the summer and fall, Farsi has moved into the top 10 languages of the blogosphere, indicating that blogging continues to play a critical role in debates about the important issues of our times.

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Blogs are part of Web 2.0 What’s web 2.0 ?

“Individuals increasingly take cues from one another rather than from institutional sources like corporations, media outlets, religions, and political bodies. To thrive in an era of Social Computing, companies must abandon top-down management and communication tactics, weave communities into their products and services, use employees and partners as marketers, and become part of a living fabric of brand loyalists.”

Forrester research

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What else is there in Web 2.0?

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Blogging helps in Search

Frequent posting Google indexing Permalinks Backlinking

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Why should organizations blog? “We've moved from the information age to the

participation age, and trust is the currency of the participation age. Companies need to speak with one voice and be authentic. Blogging allows you to speak out authentically on your own behalf, and in the long run people will recognize that. Do it consistently and they trust you.”

Jonathan Schwartz, President and COO of Sun Microsystems (http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan)

One key data point that stood out for me: 24% of Gen Yers read blogs, which is twice as often as the 12% of Gen Xers (ages 27-40) and three times the 7% of Young Boomers (ages 41-50) that read blogs. So skeptics of blogs should suspend their disbelief and look to at least one bell weather demographic to get an idea of how widespread blog readership can potentially grow in the future.

Forrester Research

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Honeywell’s Career Blogs

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The Indian scene From agencyfaqs! - I-Cube,2006 a report on Internet in India is out. The

survey was conducted by IAMAI and IMRB International. "It states that 32 per cent of the active users of the Internet in India rely on it as a primary

source of information and research. In 2001, this figure was only 20 per cent. Active users - access the Internet at least once a month.“

The survey reveals that there are 37 million Internet users in India, 23 million of them active users. Ever user category is defined as someone who has used the Internet at least once

This escalation in the number of active Internet users can be seen as a consequence of the new innovations that have taken place in the content space in recent times, in the form of online ticketing, weblogs, product information and preview sites

32% of the active internet users use search as their primary application The glamour of chat seems to be fading away even amongst the College

Going segment, with Information search emerging as the 2nd most prominent reason for surfing Internet

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Internet usage in India

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Usage patterns

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Types of blogs

Personal blogs Linkblogs Team blogs Blogs without commenting facility Private blogs Videoblogs

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Internal Blogging

Internal communication Project Management Community Building Knowledge Management Personal KM Learning Platform

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Cultural issues Blogging is the easy part Focus has to be in integrating

blogging with other organizational systems of communication, knowledge management and information sharing

Should there be an incentive? Integrating blogging into the lives of

the ordinary employees

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Attributes of a blogger

“Peripheral vision” Passionate about one’s subject Witty, Sense of Humor Guts to have a point of view Conversational Sensitive to others, thick skinned

for criticism

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The best way to start Advice from David Weinberger (quoted

in Business Blogs: A Practical Guide) Try it out. What can it hurt? Write about what matters to you The more links the merrier Write quickly and hit the “post” button.

It’s liberating I would add:

Comment on others’ blogs Have faith in serendipity

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Companies that blog Sun Microsoft Google GM Salesforce.com Recent entrant -

Infosys Consultants

Tom Peters and Forrester’s Charlene Li

Indian organizations planning to get into (external) blogging

JWT Motorola India

Indian organizations already blogging

Tata Interactive Systems

Thoughtworks Infosys

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Tracking Blog traffic

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Community Blogs – Recruiting.com

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Learning & OD

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What makes a blog exceptional?

A distinct “voice” Insights Opinions

Controversial ? Links Conversation

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Sun’s CEO’s Blog

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Charlene Li’s Blog

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Bob Lutz’s Blog

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What’s next? Wikis

Better than blogs for knowledge creation

Annotation facility Many to many communication With Google’s acquisition of JotSpot

will become more mainstream Social Networking

Orkut, Ryze, Linkedin

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Conclusions Blogging is merely a tool Other organizational processes need to be tied in Cultural mindset is the single biggest challenge Blogging is not for everybody Done right it is a great communication medium It is generational in context – More Gen Yers read

blogs than Gen Xers. Organizations need to get their focus of blogging

right – why do they want to do it

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Thanks !

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Q&A

Gautam Ghosh Phone: +91-98665-11236 Mail: [email protected] Firm: http://imagence.googlepages.com Comment at http://gauteg.blogspot.com Visit my webpage at

http://gautam.ghosh.googlepages.com

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References and Thanks to:

The Business Blogs: A Practical Guide by Bill Ives and Amanda Watlington

Technorati Forrester Research Shel Israel – Blogger, Author Dina Mehta – Blogger, Market

Researcher