CRA Inc

13 Apr 04 @ 11:49 pm

10 Rules For Using Weblogs

MarketingProfs has posted its 10 rules for using blogs and wikis. We’ve posted about blogs quite often, and gave readers a heads up on wikis recently, and this MarketingProfs piece is an addition worth reading.

It leads with a premise with which we agree: that more companies get blogs wrong than right. The MarketingProfs example:

To promote a new flavored-milk product called Raging Cow, Dr Pepper/Seven Up had a “cow” post random comments about a cross-country trip. Although the target audience was 18- to 24-year-olds, the comments appealed more to third-graders.

A sample: “‘How would a cow know diddly about the phases of the moon?’ Good question, but ever since that whole jumping over the moon incident, we cows and yonder moon have been TIGHT.”

Ugh. The rule I’d most like leaders and internal communication professionals to read is Number 8:

Use blogs for knowledge management: Despite its critics, knowledge management (KM) has not been over-promised; rather, vendors have under-delivered. Blogs can address the gap between KM promise and requirements by letting local expertise emerge. Here’s a good background on blogs and how Lucent is using them in KM. Other companies using blogs effectively include DaimlerChrysler, Hartford Financial Services Group, IBM and ESPN.

For the record, CRA has used blogs for our intranet and KM solutions since 2002.

posted in category(s): Tools in Practice