Does your company operate a blog? Should it?

I think most companies – especially those selling in passion-based markets – should answer “yes.” To see why, simply ask yourself the following questions:

  1. Has your company created an online community for committed product loyalists – a place that offers customers a voice, but won’t sink to the lowest common denominator that typifies message boards?
  2. Can your customers talk back to your $10,000 ads?
  3. Are you spending thousands on ads making one impression of one message instead of a blog delivering dozens of impressions of a dozen messages… every week?
  4. Is your PR staff leveraging a channel that rapidly disseminates information in an insanely networked world – one that multiplies the reach of your information instead of diminishing it?
  5. Are you leveraging the CRM tool that actually engages customers (instead of “managing” the relationship via largely cold, impersonal media)?
  6. When are you going to add humanity and passion to your marketing mix – or how you’d feel about a steady flow of Web traffic so qualified that no search engine can match it?
  7. Are you ready to handle the occasional challenging customer?
  8. Can you build a process that truly delivers good content to a blog on a regular basis?

Finally…

Once you’ve decided your company needs a blog, you’ve got one final question. Do you want a blog that truly engages readers and unites them behind your company’s vision?

Or a schmaltzy, largely disregarded PR effort that delivers tired – interrupt – content through a new (and now largely wasted) media channel?

[tags]business blogging, corporate blog[/tags]

Posted in Blogging and tagged .