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Blogging started off as a fun way to share about yourself and showcase your personal passions. Now it is becoming more common to use blogs as tool in business to further your marketing or public relations strategy. There are ways to do this well and there are certainly pitfalls to avoid when using Blogs.

This article will show you how to do that so you can make sure your Blog is one of the Good ones, not one of the ‘Ugly’ or downright commercially dangerous ones.

Principle 1: Blog Responsibly

Be careful that employees don’t reveal sensitive company information on your blog. You don’t want one of your employees blogging about an upcoming marketing strategy to one of your competitors. This could spell disaster for your business.

Principle 2: Know thyself and thy blogging

Once upon a time, blogs were like online diaries with notes, entries, comments and questions. These days there are some groundbreaking blogs out there using very innovative multi-media strategies. As well as knowing your own strengths and weaknesses, stay in tune with what other people are doing and incorporate some new ideas into your own blogging.

(See for example General Motors’ excellent blog: http://fastlane.gmblogs.com/).

Principle 3: Know thy enemy blogger

There are some incredible blogs out there doing very innovative stuff and one of the best ways to make sure your company becomes one of them is to ‘creatively emulate’. Do what Cory Miller suggests and ‘study the great blogs and learn what makes them great’. This will not only inspire you but also give you great strategies.

Principle 4: Blog effectively

One of the important things with blogs is to think consistently about what will be the best strategy for your company. For example, Thomas Nelson Publishing recommends that you have your employees host blogs separately to your company so as to distance personal opinions from company policy. However, a smaller company might do the opposite of that strategy and have all employees post their blogs on the company website to create more of a ‘community feel’.

Principle 5: Blog with Vision

Take what you’ve already learned about blogging; put it into new perspectives, and attempt to predict directions in your particular niche, from the implementation of new strategies and technologies, to possible blogging avenues as yet unexplored.

Principle 6: Blog with Depth

This implies that you’re always looking for the unseen advantages of blogging, which means looking at corporate blogging for what it is: an effective TOOL for marketing and advertising. By keeping your eye on the ball you always know WHY, HOW to, and how NOT to blog. The best corporate bloggers always look at blogging in this way.

Principle 7: Keep note of blogging details

The more attention you pay to what is happening on your blog, the more effective it will be. It’s just like a pot plant – the more energy and attention you give it, the better it will grow.

Principle 8: Avoid blog overuse

Always remember that blogging is just one strategy that can serve your internet marketing efforts. There are plenty more internet marketing strategies that are just as effective and can also be used in conjunction with a blog strategy.

Understanding the Good, The Blog and the Ugly is about realizing how to get the best out of your company blog and avoiding any negative consequences. When you follow the 8 steps to effective blogging you will be off to a good start.

It is important to lay down rules for your employees in how to represent the company when blogging under the company’s name. If you do not do this you could open yourself to libel and defamation law suits in the blink of an eye.

You can set up a blog with a free blogging service such as www.blogger.com, but I recommend you use your own domain to set up your blog using WordPress or Moveable Type – that way you have much more control over the process.

http://www.wordpress.org http://www.movabletype.org/

Both of these services provide plenty of supporting documentation. You’ll be stepping into the blogosphere before you know it…

Filed under: Business