To blog or not to blog – that’s the question

Blogs (weblogs) are more popular than ever.
Apart from supplying a plat form for personal opinions or promoting a cause, bloggers have also voiced their opinions about the companies they work for, office politics and products and services.
As a result, some bloggers have been fired from their jobs for what they thought were innocuous posts.
Blogs show up in search engines – sometimes a blog has a higher ranking than the company that is discusses.

News is often posted on blogs with comments, which makes it hard for PR department to monitor or manage it.
The media go more and more directly to the blogging staffers to get hot news from the horse’s mouth, thus neatly bypassing the official company spokesperson.

Especially investor relations departments are having legal nightmares - an innocent remark on a blog (including the corporate one!) can reveal critical info to the general public before investors are being informed.
David Hornik wrote an interesting article about the legal complications on ventureblog.

For companies that consider starting a corporate blog, there are some items to take into consideration.

Does having a blog fit the corporate image?
If blogging is not standard in the industry that the company operates in, it might be wise to consider if being a blog pioneer is appropriate.
In the case of Google (owner of blogger.com), having a corporate blog makes perfect sense.

What are the benefits or having a corporate blog?
A blog might be a better and more efficient way to be in contact with the target audience.
Stone Creek Coffee introduced its blog to enhance customer relations.
Asking the advice of blog readers on a new product idea is an efficient way of doing market research.
It is also an efficient way to give information to (potential) customers and directly target their need for specific information.
A good example is the Ford blog on the safety of its Mustang.
However, just having a blog for spreading news might not be the most efficient option.

What are the expectations of the blog?
The company and its employees must know what the blog is all about and support its goals.
A blog is only useful when it has added value to the company.
It should never replace another avenue.

Who can blog?
The company must define who can blog – depending on the goals.
Sales should blog if the goal is product information.
PR should blog if the goal is more transparency and branding.
Marketing should blog if the goal is market research.
Microsoft allows two of its employees to blog for the purpose of recruitment:
Gretchen Ledgard, a senior technical recruiter at Microsoft.

Who manages the blog?
It is crucial that one department (corporate communications/PR) manages the blog entries and comments, as well as the frequency.
The blog is another marketing/PR tool and should be comply with the corporate brand and style.

How does the company blog?
Since the blog is part of the whole corporate branding, it is important that the writing style is in sync with the other corporate collateral, including the corporate website.
Similar to newsletters, the blog must follow a certain format: length, content, contact details and frequency.
An interesting case study is the one of Cheskin.

In short, a company blog can be a great addition to the marketing and PR mix when handled properly with a sharp eye on trends and legislation.
Since blogs are dynamic, they must be managed well and in sync with the corporate guidelines. Due to legal ramifications, the company must make sure that there are strict guidelines and procedures.
The corporate communications department should be in charge, working closely together with the different contributing departments as well as the legal and human resources department.

Homepage Marketing

As we all know, a corporate homepage is the face of a company.
And like in real life, you cannot undo a bad first impression.
The homepage of a company must tell the visitor in one shot what the company is all about.
If it is too cluttered or doesn’t convey what products or services are being offered, the visitor will leave never to return.
A corporate homepage must be so inviting, that the visitor will click through to other pages and get the correct information or contact the company.
It’s called homepage marketing.

Successful homepage marketing consists of five phases.

1. The company must perform an internal and external research in order to understand the corporate branding directives.
   
   The branding on the homepage has to be in sync with the rest of the corporate collatural, including logos, colors, product names etc.
   An excellent example is the homepage of the Coca Cola Company.
   The Unilever homepage on the other hand, doesn’t have a core message.
   The company’s positioning as “healthy to a tea” is confusing – especially with the graphics used.
   There is also no consistency between the homepage and the rest of the web pages – each page has a different layout and use of graphics.
   Even the logo is different from the U that Unilever normally uses in its collatural.
   
2. The design of the homepage must reflects what the company stands for.
   
   The homepage of ICI doesn’t reflect its core business (chemicals) - it comes across as a cosmetics company.
   The homepage of Pfizer, on the other hand, explains in one shot what the company does.
   
3. In larger companies, different departments want to be a part of the homepage.
   
   Each department wants to direct traffic from the homepage to its specific product or service.
   The way to handle these (sometimes contradicting) demands, is allocationd of a fixed and appropriate part to each (strategically important) depratment or business unit.
   Computer Associates’ homepage handles this very well.
   They divided their homepage in 4 sections that each have a key title that invites clicking. They cleverly avoided lots of text and explanations on their homepage.
   Another example is the agricultural company Bunge.
   They created the perfect balance between the core business and activities (top half) and the latest news and developments, including stock price (bottom half).
   An example of an unfocused homepage is IBM.
   Different departments want to promote their own business, which leaves the visitor confused.
   
4. Make the homepage (and rest of the website) dynamic.
   
   Apart from the frame with the company name and logo, all contents should be subject to regular updates.
   Apart from keeping the website information itself up-to-date, web spiders love new material and it therefore helps with the ranking in major search engines.
   
   To make sure that all contents is regularly updated, it is essential to make sure that each department supplies updates.
   Seasonal themes, summer sales, product updates, customer reviews, promotional campaigns, competitions and press coverage create dynamic content.
   A good example is the “low carbon” campaign of British Petroleum.
   An example of seasonal promotion is Harney & Sons.
   
5. Make sure to keep it appealing.
   A corporate website needs to be non-stop accessible.
   The homepage needs to be reviewed regularly for performance and contents.
   It is important to check with the target audience how they perceive the homepage as well as the rest of the website.
   The website needs to attract and drive traffic.
   This also involves looking at the number of hits, the ranking in search engines, knowing from where visitors ogin and how long they stay on each page, as well as the download time of documents or brochures.
   Tastes change – the company must keep monitoring if the homepage (still) fits the preference of the target audience.
   
   If you compare the homepage of Brooks Brothers with the one of Levi’s, you can immediately tell who their target audience is.
   Brooks Brothers serves affluent customers that like an understated classic elegance.
   Levi’s main customers are (or perceive themselves as) young and trendy.
   Both companies hit bull’s eye with their homepages.
   

Management & Marketing – Patagonian style

Once in a while, there is a company or CEO that defies all marketing logic.
A good example is the outdoor clothing company Patagonia.
Its founder and owner, Yvon Chouinard, ignores the bottom line, refers to fellow businessmen as “corpses in suits,” and blames the business world for destroying Earth and native cultures.

Despite his personal definition of an MBA (management by absence), Chouinard is brilliant in marketing and promoting his company.
Chouinard started producing his own mountain climbing equipment. He invented pitons (metal spikes) that could be removed from the rocks and reused.
During the 1970s, Chouinard's company became the largest domestic supplier of climbing equipment. The step from hardware to clothes was an easy one: climbers needed double-seated shorts out of heavy corduroy. In 1973, Chouinard decided to produce his expanded clothing line under its own brand: Patagonia.

What makes Patagonia unique?

1. Branding. Patagonia creates visions of “glaciers tumbling into fjords, jagged windswept peaks, gauchos and condors,” and hits an emotional court with the target audience. Patagonia combines 55% product content with 45% messaging.
   
2. Environmental activism. Patagonia asks its customers to register to vote and to take social responsibility.
   
3. Product quality. From its start, Patagonia gave top priority to quality control in order to guarantee a durability top-quality product.
   
4. Corporate image. Patagonia is a constant fixture on the "best-company-to-work-for" lists. It promotes flextime and has on-site childcare.
   
5. Corporate strategy. Patagonia strives on change. It tries to constantly evolve, diversify, and improve practices. It refused to partner with companies that don’t have environmental activism as part of their values, as part of their behavior.
   
6. PR. Patagonia disregards traditional media such as TV, radio and print ads and go for word-of –mouth (WOM), depending on sales and customer advocacy. To enable this, Patagonia integrates customer data across all its channels (consisting of its stores, wholesale, catalogue and online) in order to implement one communication message.
   
7. Website. Patagonia’s website is unusual – the corporate profile and pressroom emphasize social and environmental commitment combined with sales. Even the corporate sales part is an online shopping tool and not the traditional balance sheet or key figures.

The main lesson we can learn from the Patagonia case is that a company can be idealistic and profitable at the same time.
Patagonia does it by:

• being consistent in its idealism;
• making sure it has an optimal branding mix of product info and imaging;
• consistently producing high quality, durable products with word-of-mouth testimonies.