Marketing Roadmaps

Blogging

Mid-Week Link Soup

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Guaranteed to be tasty!

From BL Ochman: How to Set a Corporate Blogging Policy  Links to great article from down-under about the corporate blogging phenomenon. Her what’s next blog is a great source of information about corporate blogging.

From Dan Gillmor, and also Steve Rubel, news of the Citizen Journalist Starter Pack. Posted in other places as well I am sure. I have nothing new to add to what already has been said, other than it is really funny, and I wanted my most loyal reader (my mom) to see it!

I don’t tend to comment too much on tech issues, although I do follow them. For example, the recent “discussions” about the Google toolbar. Others who focus on the search space have been far more articulate than I could ever hope to be. Here’s the exception: you have to check out the Dougal Evil Toolbar, which I found on Threadwatch.

For non-techies, Dougal is such a crystal clear way of showing just how evil manipulating search results could be….

If you want to follow the search engine wars, you should check out Threadwatch.

Blogs and the Law

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As companies start moving into the blogosphere, can the lawyers be far behind?

Seriously, there are a number of legal issues around copyright that bloggers should be aware of. Take a look at Toby Bloomberg’s post: Corporate Blogs: Legal Red Flags.

Her post introduced me to Charles M. Smith, Pheedo’s COO and legal counsel, and his terrific post on “Who owns blog comments”

Finally, on another note, another thanks to the Diva for telling us about Alf Nucifora’s blog and in particular his post on etiquette: Boorish Business Behavior

So what’s all this about RSS anyway

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Lots of talk about Robert Scoble’s comment last week about RSS and marketing and I quote (emphasis his):

"Sorry, if you do a marketing site and you don’t have an RSS feed today you should be fired.

I’ll say it again. You should be fired if you do a marketing site without an RSS feed."

Tom Murphy, on his PR Opinions blog, more or less agrees that RSS is a good, perhaps necessary thing, but he is not as vehement as Scoble: it isn’t a fire-able offense: Fired for no RSS…. don’t be silly. One thing I like about Murphy’s posts, he often adds links to additional resources. Check them out.

Of course, Scoble himself checks in to provide additional perspective on his opinion and reports on two Jupiter analysts (Eric Peterson and Michael Gartenberg) who disagreed with him.

I agree with Scoble: they are missing the point. It isn’t about RSS. It is about making websites more active and relevant to your customers and prospects. If you DON’T have something to tell your customers at least once or twice a week, ask yourself WHY. Maybe they have things they’d like to tell each other?

For me, RSS, like weblogs, is just a way to communicate. And if your audience is reading blogs and sites in RSS aggregators, you had better be providing SOMETHING in an RSS feed. It doesn’t have to be your whole site, but at a minimum, publish an RSS feed of your latest news.

Personally, I can’t tell you how disappointed I am when I visit a new blog or website and find it DOESN’T publish an RSS feed. The only way I can stay on top of everything I read is my aggregator, and I know I am missing good stuff!

Think about it.