Debbie Weil moderated a fascinating session on corporate blogging that highlighted two very different but successful approaches to corporate blogging strategies. As Debbie aptly noted, Marc Schiller's approach represented what JohnMoore calls creationist wom and Pinny Gniwisch believes in evolutionist wom.

Debbie started the session by stating that 30 Fortune 500 companies have external public blogs;  less than 6% of Fortune 500 companies. Debbie believes that fear is one of the disincentives for corporate blogging and that it is a challenge for corporations to relinquish control and command. Debbie has written a book on corporate blogging, The CorporateBlogging Book that is being released on August 3rd. If you visit www.thecorporatebloggingbook.com  you can download a free chapter and get lots more information. She is also giving away 2 signed copies of her book in a drawing for those who participate in her 10 question blogging and rss survey.

So, what did we learn from Marc and Pinny? Marc Schiller is CEO of Electric Artists and has a client list of very big companies such as American Express and Starwood Hotels. For these clients Marc creates and manages the corporate blog....this inlcudes everything from writers to the blog design to SEO.It is as Debbie said, the creationist version. For Marc, a blog is a publishing platform. There are many flavors of blogs from event blogs to crisis blogs to employee blogs. The content is the key, not the content creator.

 In contrast to the opinion of some corporate bloggers such as Eric Kintz at HP, Marc says that posts should go up every day of the work week. Mark suggests that it is wise to develop news and episodes that make people want to visit again and again. In Mark's side of the creationist vs evolutionist debate, a corporate blog can be outsourced and be effective. He also provides SEO and metrics. Regarding the great comment on/off debate Mark says that you do need a feedback loop but that it does not have to be comments. For the most part, he notes, it is other bloggers and the media that demand comments.

Pinny Gniwich of ice.com and diamond.com created his corporate blog the old fashioned way...diy. He is the marketing guy for a family business in which his brother is the CEO. His blog is a definite evolutionist success story. He has quantifiable results that demonstrate the success that he has had growing the business through the blogging efforts. How does he handle comments? He hired someone to manage the comments.

In a brief discussion that I had with Debbie she noted that the target for her book, The Corporate Blogging Book is the reluctant corporate blogger. Since we know that there are many more reluctant corporate bloggers than there are corporate bloggers, I would suggest that everyone that believes that corporations should be blogging, buy Debbie's book for the reluctant corporate bloggger in your life.If you are a reluctant corporate blogger, either buy it yourself and take the evolutionist path; or post a comment to the blog of a blog marketing consultant, and they will be happy to escort you down the full service creationist path, or another road less traveled.

Tags: Debbie Weil, Eric Kintz, Pinny Gniwich, Marc Schiller, blogs, blog marketing, the corporate blogging book, womma, wombat2, JohnMoore

posted by Marianne Richmond

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