After weeks or months of preparation, you think you’re ready to launch your business blog. You’ve found the theme, you’ve assembled the blogging team, the software platform has been tested internally and everything looks good. But think twice before officially launching your blog. You might be surprised later. Before telling the world that there is a new blog in town, here are some essential rules to remember.

Aviva Directory is a paid general Web directory which has been launched in 2005 by Jeffrey Behrendt, in Ottawa, Canada — at least if I’ve found the correct information. It has recently published 21 Surefire Tips for a Successful Blog Launch. Some of the tips mentioned there are crucial while others can be forgotten, mainly because they’re not specifically intended for business blogs. Their first tip can be applied to all kinds of blogs, but it is particularly important for corporate blogs.

Connect with your readers through an about page and welcome message. One of the best ways to make a lasting impact is to connect on a personal level with your readers. That means letting them know who you are and what your background is.I totally agree with this one. And you should do it. It’s always frustrating to have to click on a dozen of links before finding who writes a blog — if you’re interested of course.

It’s interesting that Aviva Directory — which is not a blog — doesn’t show the same transparency that it claims is essential: try to find who’s behind the site and you’ll see what I mean. But let’s move to an even more important advice.

Don’t get seen naked: Never launch a blog with fewer than 5 posts. In the blogosphere you typically get just one shot at impressing a visitor or fellow blogger. Too many new bloggers throw up two posts and then start working on promotion. In the world of blogging, you are selling yourself and your writing. If you can’t give people a fully dressed picture of what your blog is all about and what type of writing will be on it, then why should they throw a link your way, or subscribe to your RSS feed?

In fact even large companies forget this. This is why I’m usually waiting more than a week before reviewing a corporate blog after its official birth. But many people are not as patient as I am, and will never return to your blog if there are no valid or interesting contents.

The next tips are related to your RSS feeds. But let’s look only at the first one.

Make sure a link to your RSS feed is available above the fold. Though they won’t help your AdSense revenues much, subscribers are the lifeblood of any successful blog. These devotees are often the ones providing you with regular comments, and are far more likely to be webmasters themselves (meaning more links). It should be obvious to anyone launching a blog, but it’s amazing how many new bloggers do not make a link to their RSS feed readily available.

I totally agree with the importance of showing to your readers how to subscribe to your RSS feed. However, these RSS feeds come in various flavors, and the blogging platforms are not all very friendly with you when you need to find a link to your RSS feed.

But I disagree with Aviva about AdSense: this might be somewhat important for a personal blog, but is irrelevant for a business blog. What is instead important is to subscribe to your RSS feed yourself to see how the outside world can see you your blog. Will you include your full posts on only some excerpts in your RSS feeds? I’ll revisit this subject in a full note one day.

Let’s skip the tips about “social bookmarking” or “getting networked” and move to the “link building” section. The article says you should “submit your blog to blog directories and to general web directories such as DMOZ and Aviva.” I don’t know about Aviva, but if it’s important to tell DMOZ or Yahoo! that you have a new blog, it’s like sending a message in a bottle: you’ll have to wait for months before these directories accept you. And if they don’t, they will not tell you.

There is one big tip missing from the Aviva list: be sure to ping all the major blogging directories — and the search engines — when you post a new note. This is usually easily done through options available in your blogging software.

These are some essential tips but you might have additional ones not mentioned here. Do you have some other tips for launching a blog? Please tell me about them.

Sources: Aviva Directory, Ottawa, October 23, 2006

You’ll find related stories by following the links below.

• Blogs
• Business

As Vice President of Global Marketing Strategy & Excellence for HP, Eric Kintz leads HP’s marketing strategy worldwide. He’s also the author of The Marketing Excellence blog where he openly discusses industry trends and writes about the future of the marketing function in the high-tech industry. Despite his busy schedule, Eric was nice enough to answer my questions about blogging at HP and elsewhere. Below is this long interview conducted via e-mail.

Roland: IBM, Sun or Microsoft had legions of bloggers a long time before HP. Who took the decision to catch up these other companies and to start the blogging initiative at HP?

Eric: The way you’ve phrased your question is a bit leading. Most tech companies had legions of bloggers communicating with their peer groups. HP was no different. Employees from HP hosted blogs both internally and externally. In 2004 HP decided to provide a formal space within HP.com for those conversations to take place. I believe IBM made a similar decision later in 2005.

On HP’s side, we opened the formal blog platform because our business leaders saw an opportunity to extend the conversations they were having with customers to a much broader distribution. Our enterprise businesses took the lead with a number of executives launching their own blogs on hp.com. From there, platform use expanded to other business groups within the company.

Roland: As this is your job, you’re writing mainly about marketing: how people react to your posts inside and outside HP? Are you pleased by their comments?

Eric: I have been surprised at how positively people have reacted to my blog both externally and internally. Externally I think bloggers have been appreciative of the fact that I have blogged about the future direction of marketing and how HP is responding to these trends vs. blogging about how great HP is. They also have appreciated that I was willing to engage in the blogosphere and learn from other bloggers, this is a humbling experience and I learn every day.

Internally, my blog has spread through word of mouth and has given me the opportunity to connect throughout the world with HP people who have a passion for web 2.0 and are driving innovation in all corners and levels of the organization. Here is one recent example of a HP viral marketing campaign that I discovered through my blog. I have also connected with HP Labs and discovered the great research they were conducting around word of mouth and social networks.

Roland: When did you start your blog? And can you give me some numbers (posts per month, number of visitors from inside and outside HP)?

Eric: I started my blog in April and my traffic has been increasing every month since. I have approximately 10,000 visitors every month, mostly from outside of HP. I post on average once a week, which allows me to focus on going deeper in the topics/insights vs. just reporting news or what other bloggers say. My blog was recently recognized as the #3 CMO blog by the Daily Fix Blog published by MarketingProfs.

Roland: Has this blog changed your work by reducing the ‘distance’ between you and your customers?

Eric: It has not changed my work per se, but it has allowed me to keep up to speed in a much more effective manner with the most critical marketing innovation developments by writing about new concepts, putting them to the test of the blogosphere and engaging with fellow bloggers.

One of the most interesting and rewarding experiences was getting recently together with leading marketing bloggers and sharing thoughts around the opportunities and challenges of blogging –- we wrote a joint post and cross-posted on all our blogs and it was really well received.

Roland: How many HP executives have a blog now?

Eric: Nine executives have a HP hosted blog but many more have their own blogs outside of the HP platform. A great example is Phil Mckinney, the Chief Technology Officer for our PC business[, who writes the Killer Innovations blog.]

Roland: And how many HP employees blog outside from the official platform?

Eric: It is difficult to say as many have personal blogs talking about their family or hobbies. Clearly many employees have their own blog outside of the HP hosted platform; I think it is a great thing as it helps employees better understand what blogging is about and how they can use these new communication platforms in their work.

Roland: Is there a corporate blogging policy?

Eric: Yes, we do have a corporate blogging policy and guidelines in place. I strongly recommend that every large company have one, even if they don’t want to start their own blogging platform. The blogging policy is structured around 6 key guidelines and best practices to help HP employees make the most of blogging’s potential.

Roland: Time is often an issue with blogging: how do you find the time to do it? and how much time do you spend between reading, researching and writing? Is is part of your official job?

Eric: Time is clearly a very difficult issue, which I personally struggle with a lot. I tend to write on planes or in the evening. I usually take a few weeks to write a post, coming up with the initial idea though reading or by connecting with somebody and develop my thoughts over a period of time. Each post takes approximately 2-3 hours to write if you add up the various pieces. Blogging is not part of my official job but driving marketing innovation is and I view blogging as an enabler of that responsibility.

Roland: Besides writing about marketing issues, do you use your blog to stay in touch with other French people living in Silicon Valley?

Eric: Not really… Most people do not know that I am French! Shhhh… But it’s a great idea!

Roland: Besides that, are you happy to live in the U.S? And do you plan to return to France one day?

Eric: I really enjoy living in California. It has an amazing combination of business innovation and great outdoor lifestyle. I would have a hard time living elsewhere…

Roland: Are you hooked to blogs? Could you stop blogging tomorrow?

Eric: I am definitely hooked; I have come to realize how much quicker I get the information I need and learn about new trends. More and more mainstream media journalists get their news from blogs and it is already old news when I read it in the newspaper. I think I could stop blogging but I cannot stop reading blogs.

Roland: Do you plan to use sometimes your blog as a promotional tool, like Jonathan Schwartz does implicitly for Sun from time to time?

Eric: Do you mean for example when Jonathan blogs about publicity stunts (read my answer)? :) I do blog about HP initiatives when I think that we are doing something cool in marketing.

Roland: Where is going HP now that IBM sold its PC division to IBM? Do you want to be #1 and replace IBM?

Eric: According to financial analysts and some media, HP may well be the largest technology company by the end of this year. [For example, you can read “Tech Has A New Top Dog” (BusinessWeek Magazine, June 19, 2006 issue).]

Roland: Finally, do you have a message to deliver to my readers?

Eric: Learn more about the blogosphere (personally and as marketer), understand its power as well as its shortcomings. Is there too much hype? OF COURSE! However remember the hype surrounding the first wave of dot-coms, remember the craze, remember the crash but remember also that Google came out of this period and changed for ever the landscape of advertising.

Roland: Eric, thank you for taking the time for this conversation.

Sources: Eric Kintz, September-November 2006; and various websites

You’ll find related stories by following the links below.

• Blogs
• Business
• HP

Imagine that your company wants to start a business blog. But who will write the contents? Who will answer comments and build the community? Maybe a member of your staff can do it. But chances are that she has already too much work. And does he write well? Can she find new ideas for daily posts? Is there another solution to build a better blog? You bet. Simply, as reports WebProNews in “Professional Blogging: Effective Outsourcing,” just hire a professional blogger. But read more…

But what is professional blogging?

Professional blogging, as a paid writer for other blogs, has a very bright future. Writing blog posts for other blogs is truly a win-win situation for everyone involved.

The professional blogger gets paid to post, and the blog owner has postings magically appear at predetermined intervals. This is especially true for the growing number of company business blogs that appear almost daily.

Of course, it will cost you — slightly — more money that if some of your employees were writing the blog. But with all the other things they have to do, who knows if there will be a good post tomorrow?

And you’ll probably be rewarded sooner than you think by hiring someone not working for your organization.

A business blog increases company revenue over time through the marketing and relationship building power of the blog. As a result of the additional financial gains, hiring a professional blog writer or team makes financial sense for many business owners and managers. The fees charges by the blogging professional could be much less than the added revenue, the cost of hiring an additional staff member for blogging, or from the time saving from not reassigning blogging duties to a current staff member.

And don’t forget that a professional blogger can do many other things, such as relieve you from the technical aspects of blogging — yes, they exist — or train your staff to maintain the blog in the future. Still, outsourcing at least the initial steps of your blog is certainly a wise solution.

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In addition to what writes WebProNews, there are some other things to consider. First, you need to find a professional blogger who understands your business and can use the language of your industry. And second, you need to find one in the first place.

For example, in France, I don’t know many professional bloggers. There is Sophie Kune who writes Vous les hommes for Celio, a French-based chain of men’s apparel. Of course, I’m also writing Emerging Technology Trends for ZDNet.com, part of CNET Networks, Inc.

There are obviously lots of PR or ad agencies that can help you. But without starting a polemic, these agencies can only build blogs serving as sales assistants, not the ones you’re dreaming of and that will lead your customers to talk with you.

So if you want to build a successful company blog, hire a professional blogger. Or simply contact me.

Source: Wayne Hurlbert, for WebProNews, September 12, 2006

You’ll find related stories by following the links below.

• Blogs
• Business

In The 12 reasons why UK businesses don’t blog, the UK firm E-consultancy.com looks at why businesses and brands are reluctant to use blogs. Many of these top reasons are valid for other countries as well. For example, you might be the CEO and be afraid that your employees start to write inappropriate things. Or simply, your PR agency or yourself don’t understand what a business blog would bring to your company. But read more for my favorite reasons…

Chris Lake, the author, writes that to the contrary to what happens in the US, UK and European marketers are ignoring blogs. And he decided to find why. Here are two of these reasons.

You think it is too risky to allow your colleagues to write blog posts.

Maybe it is. But it probably isn’t, with appropriate guidance and a little prior training in the arts of SEO and copywriting.

You set the guidelines, the subject matter, the overall content framework. They will abide by those rules, because that’s what employees are generally good at (the ones who aren’t good at obeying rules tend to become ex-employees rather quickly).

Well, this is pretty straightforward. But let’s jump to the final possible motive for not starting a business blog.

You think blogging isn’t right for your business.

You might be right. But at least be aware of the benefits of blogging before you make this call. Remember that you do not have to talk exclusively about your business on your blog, nor give away any trade secrets. Nobody cares that you got a new printer for your office, and that it makes a whirring noise that is annoying everybody. They do care about what you have to say about subjects relevant to your business, your products, your policies…

Lake also links to a list of British corporate/brand blogs compiled by Suw Charman from Corante.

What do you think of these reasons for avoiding business blogs? Are they valid in your country? Do you know about additional ones preventing a company or a brand to start a blog?

Source: Chris Lake, for E-consultancy.com, July 5, 2006

A US online merchant and comparison shopping site, Pepperjam, has just coined a new word, shogging, an aggregation of shopping and blogging. The company wants its customers to blog about — in fact to comment on — what they’ve purchased in its online store. So far, there are very few comments, but this part of the shopping site only opened two days ago. So we’ll have to revisit it in a couple of months to see if it draws their customers’ attention and if ’shogging’ becomes a popular concept. But read more…

So how do you shog? The illustration below resumes the process (Credit: Pepperjam).

The company gives more explanations on this page. What does it mean to SHOG?

Shopping + Blogging = Shogging, it’s that simple!

Pepperjam’s “Shogging” technology unifies two of the internet’s most popular activities: shopping and blogging. Shogging on Pepperjam is different than anything you’ve ever experienced before because the experience is unified and integrated. Unlike a typical comparison engine experience where your shopping and reviewing (now that’s outdated, isn’t it!) are done separately, on separate pages, and in some cases, different websites, the Pepperjam Comparison Shopping Blog allows you to comparison shop (millions of products / thousands of merchants), read and write blogs, and never leave your unique, individual shopping experience. Isn’t technology great! We think so.

Here is a link to the press release which announced “the Internet’s First Comparison Shopping Blog.”

Kristopher B. Jones, President & CEO of Pepperjam, said, “Unlike a typical comparison engine experience where shopping and reviewing are done separately, on separate pages, and, in some cases, different websites, the Pepperjam Comparison Shopping Blog allows users to comparison shop, read and write blogs, and never migrate away from their unique, individual shopping experience.

Will it work? I really don’t know. First, it is not easy to post a comment. And second, it’s also difficult to find ones. But as this shopping blog is brand new, let’s see how it evolves in the months to come.

Source: Pepperjam company

I was reading this morning that the editor of a teenager magazine in Australia started a blog last year. And now, Dolly magazine’s editor Bronwyn McCahon relies on her blog, and not on her web site, to maintain strong ties with her community of 14-to-17-year-old readers. And as readers wanted more interactivity, she added SMS and other mobile ways to continue to grow this community. But read more…

Here are some of the discoveries McCahon made after starting the Dolly’s blog.

SMS and the internet are the “backbone of communication” to her target 14-to-17-year-old readers. Building an online community around the Dolly brand is also an opportunity for marketers, Ms McCahon says.

She adds that this market is so competitive that you need to find new ways to capture the minds of these versatile readers.

“With a teen market, there is so much competition for their time and money that it makes sense to access them at every point. A sponsor event might be in the magazine, on the website and the blog and in an SMS update so advertisers get a complete package. They’ll see straight through a straight sell, but if there’s something in it for them like a discount on underwear, the readers say, ‘Cool, Bron, thanks’.”

So McCahon decided to use the tools of our mobile society.

Readers can also sign up to a “mobile club” that distributes marketing tools such as discount vouchers. Dolly will soon roll out a more sophisticated mobile portal. “This generation will text their friends or (send a) picture message about their purchase,” McCahon says. “The power of SMS is incredible.”

And some marketing specialists are going even further.

Matthew Costello, co-founder of mobile marketing company 5th Finger, says marketers and brands are demanding “three-screen” marketing: strategies with television, internet and mobile elements. “They know the consumer may spend time in front of the TV or flicking through a magazine, or on their phone on public transport, and they don’t want to be there in a disparate and disorganised way,” he says.

So will the text-only blog disappear? Will we have all to endorse such ‘multi-screen’ marketing strategies for our blogs? Time will tell, but I’d happy to know what you think.

Source: Nick Miller, Sydney Morning Herald, Australia, June 20, 2006

How do you measure the success of a blog? There are many different metrics, including the number of unique visitors, the number of pages viewed or the number of external links to a particular blog. But some bloggers claim to be successful because they attract a large number of comments. Is this a good measure? Are comments really meaningful? And are they visible? A recent study from the Informatics Institute at the University of Amsterdam and Nielsen BuzzMetrics gives us some insights on this phenomenon. One of the conclusions of this report is clear: comments are not explored even if they represent 30% of the contents of a blog on average. Therefore, it can be argued that they’re almost useless and that their number doesn’t count — except for the blog owner and the commentators themselves. But read more…

The full survey is available online as a PDF document, “An Analysis of Weblog Comments” (8 pages, 260 KB. And you’ll find some essential numbers below. Of course, you can disagree with the method used by the two researchers, Gilad Mishne and Natalie Glance. Nevertheless, they looked at about 36,000 blogs picked from the Blogpulse index, which is large enough to draw some valid conclusions.

Below is a table showing some of the key numbers of the survey (Credit: report mentioned above).

What are the essential conclusions of this report?

• Comments constitute a substantial part of the blogosphere, accounting for up to 30% of the volume of weblog posts themselves.
• On average, comments are shorter than weblog posts (in terms of text length); we estimate that the textual size of the “commentsphere” is 10% to 20% of the size of the blogosphere.
• [Comments are invisible:] Less than 2% of comment content is currently available in syndicated form.
• A large number of comments is consistent with the influence level a weblog or post has.
• Clearly, commented weblogs are substantially more read and linked to. However, there is a chicken-and-egg situation here: assuming a fixed percentage of weblog readers post comments, weblogs which have more incoming links and more readers are more likely to have higher amounts of comments.
• Finally, we offer a novel way to determine the level of controversy caused by a weblog post by analyzing the type of comments written in response.

After reading the whole survey — or my selected excerpts — a question remains: are comments a good indicator of the success of a blog? As they remain invisible for the most part — you have to visit a blog and voluntarily click the “Comments” link of a post to read them — it seems that comments are only important to the blog owner and to the commentators themselves.

So what do you think? Do you read the comments addressed to you? Do you count them? Are you proud when one of your note attracts a dozen comments? Please post your thoughts.

Sources: Informatics Institute, University of Amsterdam and Nielsen BuzzMetrics, April 10, 2006

If you own a small company, you’ve certainly heard some people telling you that you need a blog for various purposes such as marketing. But is it worth the time you’ll spend? In a series of two articles published last week, BusinessWeek answers this question and tells you how to start a blog. There is nothing revolutionary in these articles, but this is a good summary to read before investing your time in a blog about your business.

In part one of this series, “Does Your Small Business Need a Blog?“, Karen Klein looks at some advantages of blogs, such as a low entry barrier in terms of technology or an easy way to build a personal relationship with your customer. But she also notes some drawbacks, the major one being the time necessary to manage your blog, updating it frequently or answering comments. Here is an excerpt.

Blogs must be updated frequently — several times a week, if not daily or even several times a day — in order to hold readers’ attention. “Depending on the situation, small-business owners either have [no time] because they’re constantly working on their businesses, or it’s the only resource they have since there are no hard dollars associated with it,” says [Josh Hallett, a business consultant who specializes in blogs.]

In part two, “The ABC’s of Beginning Your Blog,” Klein tells you what to do before starting a blog. And she strongly advises you to sit down for a while and think about what you want to achieve before starting to type your first post.

A small business which decides to enter the blogosphere should set specific goals and expectations up front. For instance, a goal might be to bring customers into a discussion about your company’s products and use their feedback to inform your development efforts. Your expectations for the project might be to expand your online presence and enhance your site’s status in search engines.

Klein also says that you can reduce the time needed to manage your blog by forming an alliance with other businesses.

Small companies that have formed alliances with other businesses could launch joint blogs that would help them share the work with others and deliver more interesting content to their readers, suggests [Ruth Bielobocky, president of Ion Design.] “An interior designer, furniture store, and painting company could form a blog to share current trends in their industries and cross-promote each other. [Just make sure] all parties are equally dedicated to the effort,” she says.

Klein also looks at more practical issues, such as selecting the right blogging software, and points you to some useful resources.

If you already have a blog, these articles might help you to look at it with a fresh eye. And if you don’t have one, please read them carefully several times before taking the jump.

Finally, what do you think of her suggestion to form an alliance with other businesses to publish a blog? And do you have great examples of such blogs? Thank you for sending me some pointers.

Sources: Karen E. Klein, BusinessWeek Online, May 15 and 18, 2006

If you’re using the media to promote your products, you’ve heard about Richard Edelman’s public relations (PR) firm even if you never hired his company. The Wall Street Journal interviewed him recently and asked him what he thought about the need for transparency in PR and the rising use of the Web (Paid registration required). Read more for selected excerpts from this conversation.

For example, here is Edelman’s answer to the question “What PR practices are simply not acceptable?”

For me, and I think this applies in mainstream media as well as in the blogosphere, you’ve got to make sure that companies understand that they have to identify themselves, tell why they are doing what they are doing and make clear whatever financial arrangement there is with a sponsorship. This is an era of total transparency.

And here is what he said about blogs.

Q: Your enthusiasm for blogs is well known; you have even hired noted bloggers to help clients develop an expertise in the format. With so much attention devoted to blogs in recent months, are you concerned that the whole platform has developed into a fad?

I don’t think so. I really see that this area of self-expression is bridging, clearly, into mainstream media…[traditional media outlets] are trying to accommodate a world in which the citizen feels as if he wants to not just be a spectator but also in some way a player, or have his voice heard.

Do you agree with him? Will be blogs become part of the mainstream media?

Source: Brian Steinberg, The Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2006 (Paid registration required)

In fact, it’s not entirely true, but Southwest Airlines blog really took off last week. Nuts about Southwest is a moderated blog hosted by about 20 employees who write about their jobs at the airline, but also about the travel industry. So you’ll find posts from managers and mechanics as well as captains or flying attendants. The airline says it will welcome comments from customers, but one thing is sure: these comments might be edited — or not published. Anyway, when will we see an official blog from Air France?

But let’s look at the Southwest Airlines blog user’s guide.

Our goal with this blog is to give our readers the opportunity to take a look inside Southwest Airlines and to interact with us. This is as much your blog as it is ours. We have lined up a crew of bloggers representing a diverse cross-section of our Company. The most current postings will be found on the home page, and we have organized the archives by category. We want to build a personal relationship between our bloggers and you, and we need your participation. You are the “other half” of this blog, and our bloggers can’t wait to communicate with you, so get busy posting.

Nice words: it almost looks like a press release. But wait, there is more.

This is the point where we insert the “fine print” and discuss the guidelines for posting. The Southwest Blog is starting out as a moderated site because we want to ensure that everyone stays on topic. We would LUV for you to post your thoughts, comments, suggestions, and questions, but when you post, make sure that they are of general interest to most readers. Of course, profanity, racial and ethnic slurs, and rude behavior like disparaging personal remarks won’t be tolerated nor published.

The key word here is “moderated.” I’m sure some of you will object to this, but this is exactly what I’m doing here. I only accept relevant comments — no spam, no rude language.

So what do you think about this Southwest Airlines blog? Is this a PR trick or a real effort by the company to connect with its customers?