Business Blog Advice

The first week of March, there will be a new e-book that you can download right from this website. The book is called The Triangle System: Blogging Your Way Up the Search Engines, and the title pretty much says it all.

This book is more of a training manual than general blogging book. Specifically, it will teach you a three-part publishing system with the power to drive your blog / website up the search engine ranks.

There are no tricks or deception to this strategy. Just a solid technique for publishing quality content onto the web … and be rewarded with excellent search engine position.

People First, Search Engines Second
One of the main premises of this book is the notion of “people first and search engines second.” Anyone who knows me is familiar with this expression, because I use it a lot. In this book, I will teach you to create a blog-based resource that your target audience will love. The fact that this system will also improve your search engine ranking is just icing on the cake.

A Corporate Blogging Resource
This book will benefit anyone involved with corporate blogging, whether it’s a staff writer maintaining a portion of the company’s blog, or a CEO running his or her own blog. After all, anyone involved in business can benefit from increased exposure. Right?

This book is in the final edit stage and will be online soon. I’ll post it right over there in the right-hand column. Trust me, if you’re involved in corporate blogging in any way, shape or form … you don’t want to miss this book.
~Brandon

What the heck is “Web 2.0,” and why should a CEO or other corporate communicator care about it?

I’ve tried to offer some insight into these and other questions by creating, in essence, a CEO’s guide to Web 2.0. We will look at some key applications of the Web 2.0 universe — blogs, forums, networks and other social media. And we’ll also look at how some corporations have used these tools to the their advantage.

Here’s the article:
Communicating in Web 2.0 - Blogs, Wikis, Forums and Networks

~Brandon

Ann Handley, Chief Content Officer at MarketingProfs, blogs about the online creativity of real estate professionals. As blogs and other social media continue to grow in popularity, the real estate industry is catching on.

The number of real estate blogs has risen steadily over the last few years, as those in the real estate professional look for new ways to reach home buyers and sellers. Ann also points out how the real estate industry is adapting other forms of “Web 2.0,” such as the wiki.

Read Ann’s Post:
Real Estate 2.0: The Future of Buying and Selling Houses

I just posted a new article about corporate blogging, written by Kari White. It’s a well-written laundry list of blogging practices that will keep readers coming back to your blog, time and time again.

An excerpt:

“Making your blog into a blatant marketing campaign is a bad idea. Customers are looking for real answers and honest opinions. They will pick up on insincerity instantly. Use the blog for what it’s for, transparency.”

Article: Corporate Blogging: 7 Best Practices

I recently looked at the archive history of one of my marketing blogs … “all the way” back to the first post in April 2006.

It struck me that I didn’t even have any opening remarks about the blog. I just sort of jumped into things and started posting. I did not set any agenda or tell readers what they could expect, because back then I had no readers.

But obscurity is not usually the case with a CEO blog, or a major corporate blog. CEO blogs often have an audience right from the start — especially when they’re launched with media fanfare, as was recently the case with Bill Marriott’s CEO blog.

Launching a CEO Blog - A Short History

So how should a CEO or corporate exec kick off a new blog? However they want, is what I say. After all, there is no protocol for such a thing. Nor should there be. Blogs (in my humble opinion) should be anti-protocol. They should be whatever the author feels, since they are an extension of the author. Good ones, anyway.

With that said, I thought it would be fun to see how some long-time CEO bloggers kicked off their blogs. Here’s a summary of first blog posts, as these CEOs embraced the blog and said “Hello World!”

• Jonathan Schwartz, COO of Sun Microsystems and a well-known corporate blogger, started off with the understatement: “Odds are, this is going to attract some attention.”
• Beth Carvin, CEO of Nobscot, launched her blog way back in 2002, with a short prediction of things to come.
• Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist, talked about his surprise at finding a Craigslist mention in the book Sex and the City.
• Karen Christensen of Berkshire Publishing Group brought her CEO blog to life with a post about slogans and taglines … and making the world a better place.
• Hu Yoshida of Hitachi began by asking for feedback on data storage, blogging, and angels dancing on the head of a pin. You’ll see.
• Alan Meckler of Jupiter Media recounted his bad trade show experience at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Vegas.
• David Sifry, founder and CEO of Technorati, started his blog way back in January 2002 with a post about digital entrepreneurs.

To be continued … probably for a while!

I’m working on a chronicle of CEO blogs from a media coverage perspective — early predictions that turned out to be false, that kind of thing.

In the meantime, I thought you might find this USA Today story interesting. It’s from May 2005, and it gives reasons why CEOs are resistant to getting “tangled up in messy blogs.” The article states that “it’s going to take a brave CEO with thick skin to enter the blogosphere.”

How accurate was this early prediction of CEO blogging? Not very. Quite a few CEOs and senior execs have entered the blogging world, with more each week.

But what do I know? I just make observations based on facts and data, not personal assumptions. I guess I’ll never get a gig at USA Today.

~Brandon

Zane Safrit, CEO of Conference Calls Unlimited, blogs about a particular dumb moment in the office. Who among us cannot recognize the crush of embarrassment Zane must have felt in this situation? I’ve had a few of those moments myself.

The moral of Zane’s story: Step up to the plate and apologize when you know you must … in business and in life in general.

Thanks for sharing, Zane.

~Brandon