Blogging 101

What Makes a Blog a Blog

•Chronological •Frequent updates•Easy to create, use and

update•Written by a real person•Focused on a subject•Subscribe-able•Interactive

The Blogosphere

Raw Numbers

Technorati tracks 70 million blogs

120,000 new blogs per day

1.4 blogs created per second

19.4 million (55%) are still posting 3 months later

3.9 million bloggers update weekly

Bloggers make 1.2 million posts a day or 50,000an hour with major spikes during major news events

Build “depth” to complement “reach”

The two-way model realized

It’s a small world: join the conversation

Be human

SEO, baby!

Meet your objectives

A Social Media Strategy

•Active Listening

•Outreach

•Engagement

Active Listening

• Find the “influentials”:TechnoratiGoogle Blog Search

• Bloglines (or other feed reader)

Monitoring

•Watching key issues and trends that are of interest to you and your organization.

Make a list of keywords for your organization:

* people* related or competitive organizations * issues * topics/news items

Outreach

•Read & Comment

•Build Relationships Behind the Scenes

•Give bloggers access to information first

Commenting Tips

•Value added

•Consider email

•Hanlon’s Razor

•Stand up

•Be brief

Are You Ready to Write?

Engage!

• Who will write the blog?

•A Code of Ethics

•Blog topic

•Negative Buzz

•Measuring success

Toe in the Water Strategy

•Internal blog:

•Staff

•Board of Directors

•Members

•Event blog:

•Finite in duration

•Contained in scope

Just Give ‘Em Something To Talk About....

•Explore...

•Listen...

•Get Advice...

•Commit...

•Be Passionate...

What makes a blog successful?

Among 20 “successful” corporate bloggers, most common answers:

•Culture•Transparency•Time•Dialogue•Writing Style and Personality

Questions?