Corporate Blogging: A new marketing communication tool for companies.

Today, a shift is taking place in corporate communications. One that is promising to alter marketing strategies well into the future, which is corporate blogging. Corporate blogging is publish and used by organizations to reach its organizational goals through internal, external or CEOs blogging. Current browsers which are Opera, Firefox, Safari and Internet Explorer 8 which supports RSS technology enables reader to browse recent posts easily without actually visiting the blogspot.

Marketing has always been about balancing company interest with customer interest, but know it is becoming more about opening dialogue and building trust. Through corporate blogging, company can indirectly fine-tune their marketing messages through social interactions. Blogging enables faster feedback and a more strategic understanding of where the market is heading.

From a competitive standpoint, blogging demonstrates to customers that a company cares about its products and customers. Building a relationship with customers is all about loyalty and transparency. Customers are more inclined to deal with an organization that they think they know the best. This is where blogs come into the picture. Through blogging, an organization can build its relationship with its customers and promote their products at the same time.

The 2 most common corporate blogging is internal blogging and external blogging:

(i) Internal Blogging
Internal blogging is to capitalize on the opportunity to encourage communications and knowledge flow upwards in the organization. Basically it can be accessed by all of the corporate employee throught the corporate’s intranet. Internal blogs may be used in lieu of meetings and e-mail discussions, and can be especially useful when the people involved are in different locations, or have conflicting schedules. Blogs may also allow individuals who otherwise would not have been aware of or invited to participate in a discussion to contribute their expertise.

(ii) External Blogging
An external blog is a publicly available weblog where company employees, teams, or spokespersons share their views. It is often used to announce new products and services to explain and clarify policies, or to react on public criticism on certain issues. It also allows a window to the company culture and is often treated more informally than traditional press releases, though a corporate blog often tries to accomplish similar goals as press releases do.

A corporate blog if is not properly managed and maintained,can turn from cool to catastrophic. Despite the ever blooming of corporate blogging, there are still pros and cons of it.

The Pros:
Ø Requires strong written communication skills
Ø Easy to set up a company blog.
Ø Appeals to younger consumer groups and employees
Ø Dialogue with consumers
Ø Search engine visibility
Ø Requires little budget input

The Cons:
Ø Is time-consuming to maintain
Ø Requires strong written communication skills
Ø Blogs are so popular that their credibility as a source of information is declining.
Ø Lack of control vs. over-moderation.
Ø Legal minefield, privacy concerns
Ø Hard to measure ROI