Marketing Roadmaps

Web Marketing

More on character blogs

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Lots of interesting stuff from my blogroll today. I’ll start with a comment on the July 4th Hobson & Holtz report.

Early in the show, Shel and Neville discussed a query from a listener, Sebastian Keil. Sebastian has a client, a rental car company, that is considering having a character blogging feature on its corporate blog, where the CEO will also blog. The idea was to have an occasional post from a rental car about where it recently went. Neville and Shel discussed the whole character blog thing at some length, and both agreed that it was not a good idea. You should listen to the show for the whole conversation.

It seemed to me that in the discussion about the character blog aspect (a question of form) they were missing the most important element: WHY the company thought this might be a good idea (the issue of content). Because in the WHY was the clue to perhaps a better idea for the company. I sent the following comment as soon as I got home:

As you both know, I am not at all opposed to character blogs in principle. In this case, however, I agree with you both – a character blog in the voice of a rental car is not the way to go.

My advice: I’d focus on two things Sebastian said about the project, first the WHY: they want a way to show all the ways you can use a rental car, and part of the HOW: they plan to put disposable cameras in the cars for the renters to take the pics that would tell the story.

So – I’d go with a customer blog: put the cameras in the cars, and provide an incentive for the renters to tell their stories. Then you post the best ones in the blog. The incentive could be you’d give everyone who used the camera and provided a brief diary of their trip with a custom digital photo album created from the pix and for the ones you actually use, you could give them a free day or whatever discount makes sense. End of day: you get your stories and you increase customer loyalty in the process.

With this format you could do it as a separate blog or on the blog with the CEO, whichever you preferred.

There is nothing wrong with a character blog. It is just a form. But as marketers, we really should look first to the real voices available to us. Odds are, they will be just as, if not more, compelling. Executives. Employees. Customers. Evangelists.

If after evaluating the real voices, you still believe that a character blog is the best choice, by all means, try it. It could be just the ticket. Just remember: it is hard work to make characters real, believable, compelling and consistent. After all, if it were easy, we could all be best selling novelists or award winning screenwriters. And even the best fictional franchises have been known to "jump the shark." 🙂

A character blog isn’t a bad idea just because it is a character blog. But it is a bad idea if there’s a better way.

Stuff and a question

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The stuff is just that — some interesting stuff I have been saving to post on, and haven’t had time to blog much lately. I should probably do a link blog, to make it easier to publish these links. Maybe later this summer when I have a minute to breathe.   

From Shel Holtz, two posts about RSS: a plain English guide to RSS and RS huh?

A guest post on Pro-Blogger by Toby Bloomberg on how blogs must earn their keep. (And an aside, it was great to meet Toby and a bunch of other folk at the marketing wonk after yesterday’s AMA blog seminar in Boston)

The question is about SEO techniques. I am revamping two, possibly three client websites (cross fingers), to make them SELL not just TELL, and I am curious about some SEO "things."  I am NOT an SEO expert and my clients know that. But I have had a lot of online marketing experience, which does qualify me to some degree to know what’s what. So here’s my question:

I believe that a well written website that sells not tells should do well in search engines. Yes, you should make the effort to understand the right keywords to incorporate in the copy, and there is no harm in submitting to the engines and the like, but that done: If your website sells your products AND you have a robust marketing program that drives qualified prospects to your site, what happens with the engines is additive, not the baseline of your marketing success. Agree? Disagree? What am I missing?  Bob Bly had a related question on his blog not long ago, but I don’t know that we reached closure 🙂 .

Deep Throat, blogging tips, asking for the order (and lions and tigers and bears, oh my)

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As expected, I am really busy this week with the Revenue Roundtable and client work (hurrah), plus trying to jam everything in by COB Thursday as Friday is the Scottish Terrier Club of New England Specialty Show, and I will be there all day.

However, I do have a few things to share before I race off to prepare for a new prospect meeting tomorrow.

First, the big reveal of Deep Throat. I came of political age during Watergate. I think my first adult non-fiction book was All the President’s Men and I definitely remember going to see the movie on a hot summer day in whatever year it was. It is hard to believe that all that took place more than 30 years ago…. when it still colors so much of what we feel about politics, regardless of what we believe or how we vote.

For my part, I am glad that Mark Felt, and his family, didn’t wait until after his death. For whatever reason, and however it came about, I’m glad Felt will get the accolades due him while he lives. If his family benefits, that’s great. He did a courageous thing, whatever his personal reasons were, and he deserves to get the praise in life. He’ll certainly be criticized as well — I can see the revisionist wagons circling.

So often, we wait to honor great men and women until after their deaths. I for one am pleased when the subject of the praise actually gets to hear it themselves. I remember a few years ago, here in our town, the local chamber of commerce had an event to honor an elderly civic leader who had done a tremendous amount for the town and the area. Literally put us on the map.

As my husband and I were waiting in the long line to greet the man and his wife, it crossed my mind that the whole event was a bit like a wake, except in this case, the man who actually KNEW everybody was still alive, and could enjoy the love of his community. I thought it was wonderful, and wished that we as a society were better at thanking our elders in life, not just honoring them in death.

Wakes and funerals serve an important religious and grieving function. But they aren’t really for the person who has died. So… moral of the story: take time to thank and honor people today.

Thank you, Mr. Felt.

This story will be all over the blogosphere and the media today, tomorrow, the next day, but do read Dan Gillmor’s post, Deep Throat: America owes Gratitude.

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Now a few little housekeeping things, items that caught my interest over the last week. If I had more time, I’d write more about them, but the clock is ticking…..

Standing Out from the Blogging Crowd, an item on BusinessWeek’s Blogspotting, linked to tips for better blog writing from Robin Good.

Jim Logan on the importance of asking for the order.

Scottie Claiborne on links that drive search engine rankings (seen originally on Micro Persuasion). I need to get serious about promoting this blog … one of these days.

More customer blogs

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Let’s start with the Vespa blogs. Reported in many places including Steve Rubel’s blog (CooperKatz is doing the blogs and PR for Vespa).

I am looking forward to these blogs, as I believe the customer evangelist blog has real potential as a marketing tool for certain types of companies:

  • Companies in markets where a strong sense of community develops offline and online;
  • Products or issues that elicit passion;
  • Topics and issues that are at the intersection of company and customer interests. No one wants to read a blog, written by customers or not, that JUST talks about the product;
  • If corporate-sponsored (versus a customer evangelist doing it on his own — more on that later), a sponsor that is willing to let the blog happen. The good and the bad.

As I wrote last week, I have been building this type of blog for a client for the past two months, and I am really pleased to see others embracing this model.

Others places I read about the Vespa blogs: blogspotting (with an amusing jab at the Technorati 100), BlogBusiness Summit, NevOn (who reminds us that blogs are part of an overall marketing/communications strategy, not an end in themselves), the Social Customer Manifesto.

Another company doing a unique company-sponsored blog is Nokia. It owns TheFeature, but takes a hands-off approach. As described in the About section on the site:

"TheFeature aims to be nothing less than a voice – an opinionated, independent voice for the mobility community. It is the mobile Internet industry’s premiere thinking space – designed to help you manage the flow of information in a sector where the flood of data is increasing as fast as its growth, scattered throughout multiple channels, frequently obtuse in nature, and devoid of context…."

"Although TheFeature is owned by Nokia, the Espoo, Finland-based manufacturer of technologies for mobile communications, the opinions expressed herein are solely those of its writers and content providers, and are not official statements by Nokia or any of its business partners or affiliates. The TheFeature staff and its content partners are committed to editorial independence and to the openness of its forums."

Thanks to blogthenticity for pointing me to this site.

The other type of customer evangelist blog is the customer who is so passionate that he or she creates a blog about the product. This blog is not sponsored by the company. Halley Suitt, in a post on the Tom Peters blog and an article in Worthwhile magazine, calls these corporate fan blogs and highlights some of the issues companies have to face when they have passionate fans who blog.

Issues notwithstanding, I believe that companies that are willing to either give voice to the community through a company sponsored site, like Vespa, Nokia and my client Software Secure, or can strike the proper balance with independent fan blogs, will reap tremendous benefits by engaging with their customers in this online conversation.