Digital Biographer™

Corporate Blogging: Get it? Got it? Good - by Todd Cabral and Jeff Gwynne - TheScienceOfMarketing.com

“Mention blogging to a corporate communications professional, and the reactions range from skeptical to curious, with the most frequent response being “I don’t have time for that.” Loosely translated, that means, “Blogging isn’t valuable enough for my company to invest the time in,” or “I just don’t get it.””

In a chapter entitled ‘Corporate Blogging: Get it? Got it? Good‘ Todd and Jeff show how some companies are adopting blogs as a core component of their corporate communications strategies, and are realizing real rewards in the process.

>> Read the full story from Todd Cabral and Jeff Gwynne and 236 other contributors: Buy Age of Conversation 2 today…

David Petherick is one of 237 authors who contributed to the book ‘Age of Conversation 2‘. For the first 237 days of 2009, he is highlighting a chapter from one of his co-authors, briefly discussing their contribution, and linking you to their blog or online presence.
All proceeds from sales of Age of Conversation 2 go to charity.

2.0, authors, conversation 2.0, corporate blogs, share, social media aoc2, blogging, Jeff Gwynne, Marketing, social media, Todd Cabral

This article was originally published here at Digital Biographer in January 2008. That’s Eight. A year ago. I think it still is very relevant a year later.

The significance of social networks is now starting to become obvious to the marketing departments of larger companies, largely due to two factors - 1) Traditional advertising channels are proving less and less effective and 2) Marketing and advertising agencies have started to realise where people are spending their time.

They have seen the writing on the wall - with one particular statistic likely to be a challenge for many a marketing manager: “Social networks will become the dominant channel for viral marketing campaigns - email has been the dominant channel for viral marketing campaigns since the mid 90s, but social networks will overtake it in 2008.”

Another fact that’s staring marketers in the face - a tipping point that only has one further hurdle to clear: “In October 2007, Social Networks accounted for 7.7% of upstream Internet traffic to all other websites, making the category the second most important source of traffic after Search Engines.”

The next hurdle of course is for social networks to become a more important source of traffic than search engines. That’s a whole blog of its own, however.

An article in this morning’s Financial Times is entitled “Business urged to woo social network figures“, and uses language very firmly couched in the tradition of ‘moving product’ and the pages of publications such as ‘Campaign‘. This all suggests to me that although businesses may have woken up, they have not actually smelt the coffee - they still have the urge to sell cereals.
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2.0, brand, conversation 2.0, corporate blogs, search marketing, social media Blog, Business, Marketing, Marketing and Advertising, online reputation management, social media

Blog08, Amsterdam, on the 24th October 2008, has added some great bloggers to its line-up, and tomorrow is your last chance to get an early bird discount to save €45 on the entry fee,

I’d recommend you get your name on the list today, as the early bird discount, means it’s only €150 to attend, rather than €195. With a mention in Parool.nl, and being all over the Dutch media today, and online in the likes of AD, Metro, and Trouw, the reduced price allocation may be gone very soon. You also have the chance to win a free seat at the Speaker’s Dinner on the night before the conference if you buy before Thursday.

Use this special discount promo code to save €45: digitalbio

This will be the rock’n'roll blogging event of the year in Europe, with a great host in Patrick de Laive, a great venue, and an amazing program that, of course, includes performances from a rock band… and an after-party at Odeon, Amsterdam.

And of course, it takes place on a Friday… leaving you free to enjoy an extra day or two in Amsterdam. Assuming you survive that after-party, of course.

Speakers list…

2.0, Conferences, authority, authors, corporate blogs, digital biographer, social media amsterdam, blog08, bloggers, blogging, Business, conference, rock and roll

This month, Certain Host are giving you the chance to win a free domain name!

All you need to do to have a chance of winning your very own .com or .co.uk domain name is to give the correct answer to the simple question below, and send us your name and email address (which will be only be used to notify you of the winner). Good luck!

If you can’t see the entry form here, please visit the competition entry page.

Now, it should be well known to you that Certain Host offer a free domain name with three of their most popular hosting packages, but, we’re just making sure, and spreading the world a little.

Remember - this competition closes on 30th September at 6pm Eastern Standard Time.

PS: If you need a clue with the answer to this question, try looking at the web site of a certain reliable small business web host.

awards, corporate blogs, googlicious, online identity, search marketing Business and Economy, Domain name, Web Hosting, Web hosting service, Website, World Wide Web

You may have noticed some sound files being added to this blog over the past few days. Well, you’re not alone - the people who run Utterz.com seem to have noticed too, and have created a rotating banner for the site that advertises my content.

I am deeply flattered, and felt the need to reciprocate the attention by writing a little about the site - click the image below to see why I find Utterz such a useful resource to enhance my personal brand online, and do add your own comments when you see the full-size image - you can do so easily thanks to the great Skitch application. I also enjoy the humorous cow metaphor subtly used throughout the site, where Utterz = Udders (Geddit?), so you can ‘be herd, add ‘mooving’ pictures etc.

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!
Click image for full-size view and to add your comments and thoughts

My Utterz Profile: http://www.utterz.com/~h-davidpetherick/profile.php
HTTV Shortcut: http://httv.biz/utterz/

Utterances, authors, brand, corporate blogs, digital biographer, googlicious, online identity, share, social media, sound, streams digital biographer, personal brand, sound, utterances, video

I have just turned the Digital Biographer blog into what I call a BlogPod in around five minutes with the amazing Koollage service.

The results: you can see below - and you can subscribe to the feed of my Koollage BlogPod, Embed it in your own pages, and of course absorb its contents elegantly on your mobile phone. It looks especially funky on an iPhone, with horizontal and vertical versions specifically to take advantage of the iPhone’s ability to use both formats.

An elegant feature is the ability to conduct a search within the Koollage Editor, and then select search results content added from blogs, including images. Although there might be copyright issues involved in this, fair use is obviously allowed. One of the interesting elements buit in is the ability for readers to add comments to any page in your Koollage content (and you get an email with this comment immediately), and to make your Koollage a group application, meaning that others can collaborate to create and update the content with other Koollage associates.

The service is still in beta, so has a few edges to knock off and features to tidy, but as you can see, it works, it’s very nicely designed, and it’s likely to be very viral. The site where you can join and create Koollage Pods for free, is also a growing community, so you can search for other users and their Koollage Pod (Plog) creations.

I for one can see the travel industry getting excited about using this - a City Guide Koollage of Hotels, Restaurants, and Transport Services made available to travellers hitting the ground at an airport makes sense… and a mashup with a Maps / GPS application would appear a logical move for what is obviously a very mobile application.

What uses you can see for this way on enclosing and displaying information?

Related Story: 12,000 of our Blog Visitors are missing…

2.0, authors, corporate blogs, digital biographer, mobile, mobile search, search marketing, share, social media, startup Add new tag, Cell site, Global Positioning System, Google Maps, iPhone, Koollage Pod, Mobile phone, Tag, Yelp

Google Reader is a free (and excellent) tool to let you manage your web feeds - to easily keep track of your favorite websites and see all the updates in one convenient location.

A few days ago, a little extra feature appeared. It was simple, and unobtrusive, and gently prompted me to add more information. What it means is that I can share my news from sites and blogs I find of interest with a click. But in addition, there’s a profile appearing on that page - my Google Profile. With as much or as little information as I choose to add there, including links to my choice of sites or resources.

It’s for sharing news and sites I find- for the moment. But think about it - that’s where facebook scores so highly. And delicious, and stumbleupon. And it does what bloglines and Rojo do, nicely…

Google just created a simple, easy, social network that already has some great content that i have selected. And like most of Google’s offerings, from Search to Alerts to Gmail, I’m using it simply because it’s really very useful.

I’ve created a widget from my shared Google Reader links to add to other resources online, and also created a shortcut to the shared links page: http://httv.biz/shared/

blonging, corporate blogs, googlicious, search marketing, share, social media

Facebook means business - for all kinds of businesses, small or large.

There are over 45 million people on facebook, and you can reach them as a business, and have them talking about you, talking with you, recommending you and buzzing about your products or services. Free. Or not.

Which will it be? Set up a free facebook page for your business today and start connecting with your customers.

Digital Biographer Business Page on Facebook

commerce, corporate blogs, facebook, search marketing, social media

Sometimes, someone just writes something so apt, concise and useful, you want to just say “read this”.

So - read this! 5 Ways Small Business Can Benefit From Social Media/Networking Sites which delivers exactly what the title promises, and also provides a link to a simple guide to enhance your online reputation and footprint - with a few resources that you may not have on your radar.

Written by David Wallace at Search Engine Guide

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corporate blogs, facebook, googlicious, online identity, search marketing, social media

A Facebook groupware tool has just been launched called MyOffice, which includes private discussion boards, file sharing, a schedule, and to-do lists you can share with a public or private group within Facebook.

The current MyOffice tools are pretty basic, but the three Columbia University students who created it are already responding to user feedback to improve and extend features. It’s very easy to use and seems to work well. Each project gets its own dashboard with a helpful activity stream that keeps you on top of the latest moves by team members.

This is the sort of application I have been expecting to see a lot more of since Facebook launched itself as a platform in May - something very simple but useful that lets one stop just poking around, and start collaborating with your network, and drawing in new partners and ideas to projects.

• Blog at Read/Write Web >>
  
• Install MyOffice on your Facebook Profile or Pages >>

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commerce, corporate blogs, facebook, social media

Facebook now has an even more useful application for Business - and a very simple one: you can now set up an online store to sell your business’ products or services to the 45 million+ people on Facebook.

Cleverly, it allows you to use the ecommerce solution you choose by simply allowing insertion of a payment button from your payment processor. There are 45 million Facebook users out there. I suggest you open up your retail space now - and do remember, this will also act as a name landgrab - I own the extension digitalbiographer - what should you own? The shop setup and rental is currently free…

• View the offerings at my FaceBook Digital Biographer Business Shop
• Create your own FaceBook Retail Outlet
• FaceBook For Business Club & Forum at Ecademy

commerce, corporate blogs, digital biographer, facebook, social media

Of course, you may already be paying your staff to spend time on Xing, Linkedin, Facebook and other social networks, but not know it… or maybe you ban them from doing so. You’re making a mistake. I say: don’t be dumb - get them on there before it’s too late, and you get the boot for not doing your job.

Oh yes, I’m serious. I’m actually advocating an approach where you pay your staff to use facebook and similar social networking sites to network, and promote themselves, and your business, to the world. Because otherwise, they’ll not promote you - they’ll just promote themselves. What would you rather pay for?

You could explain it to them like this: —

1. You’re valuable to the organisation not just for what you do, but for how you relate to others, and who you relate to.
2. We know you have a personal opinion, personal life, and friends and colleagues outside work. You know we wouldn’t employ anyone who didn’t.
3. So we know you have a brain. We’re not going to say “don’t use social media in work time”, because we’re social people. We like friends, chat, buzz, news, even fun. Yeah. We know you’ll get your work done better if you get to be sociable. So go do it, but remember the work is primary!
4. Keep it structured, though, and use your time well. Remember that our customers might not want to see all of our family and party photos, but they will want to see some insight and ideas that you blog about and introduce them to. So be good. But be you.
5. Remember to keep your passwords and access secure - because it’s not our reputation we are concerned about - it’s yours. We want people to say “It must be great to work for those guys - they let you network and be yourself. Maybe their stuff is good too. I’ll get in touch with them.” We might even build in some blog business bonuses…

And now I could explain it to you like this:
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corporate blogs, digital biographer, facebook, googlicious, search marketing, social media