Blogs, Archives, and Your Business
Blogs are a relatively new web phenomenon that can help or hurt your business. They're web-logs (hence blogs), a sort of electronic journal-- think of it as an online diary. This is a big new thing that's already widely established among people using the web.
Archives have been around for a while, like the library at Constantinople. But the new wrinkle is that Google is archiving all the web pages it indexes, and including those archived websites in its search results.
Here's the scenario: Somebody from your perfect audience profile goes to a search engine, types the phrases you've anticipated, and your site shows up at the top of the results. Click here to see the listing.
Underneath your website listing is an unhappy customer's blog, followed by an archived 1998 Daily Gazette column about a consumer complaint.
The next listing is your competitor. Which is where this web-surfer is clicking after skimming two negative stories-- and there's very little you can do about it.
Blogs
Blogs are online journals or web diaries, frequently updated, on a wide range of topics. Some focus on one thing, others are a stream-of-consciousness report from a diverse bunch of people. If you haven't seen a blog, here's some links: blog1 blog2 blog3 blog4.A sample of Pittsburgh blogs: Burgh1 Burgh2 Burgh3 Burgh4 Burgh5
Blogs let anybody be a web publisher, and the search engines (especially Google) value blogs as important indicators of public focus. If a unhappy customer writes about Acme in their blog, it's going to show up in Google. If the bloggers who read the initial blog decide to pile on to the topic, it'll be a feeding frenzy.
Here's a recent true story-- somebody walks into Starbucks to get a mocha latte, and snaps a few photos on their new camera. An employee approaches the customer and informs them that corporate policy says no picture taking. The customer objects, the employee persists, there's a big brouhaha and hurt feelings.
The customer tells a friend, who blogs it, and when people read the story they write about it in their blogs. Soon there's a web frenzy, there's a lot of blog chatter, and somebody even posts a new site called StarbucksPhotos.com. A local paper covers the story, and the end result is a corporate black eye, way out of proportion.
And don't forget about employee blogs. Think about your most disgruntled employee putting their tales online!
But blogs can be good for you. A happy customer who extols your virtues in her blog will do really well for you. An employee blog that presents what's going on as interesting and worthwhile is golden.
Blogs mean that every diary can be global, and the search engines think they're very important. And if they discuss your business, it's going to show up in the search engines.
Archives
Back when Life Was Simpler, when somebody wrote a letter to the editor or a consumer reporter about your business, you might get some bad press but it would fade after a few days.
Fast forward to the new millenium: the Letters to the Editor and the Consumer Advocate's column are online, and Google indexes them. Not only that, but Google archives them - saving a copy of that page even after the local paper takes it off the website. In the virtual archive, bad news has a shelf life of forever.
This is a very significant development:
what people say online about your business
will last for a very long time,
and it'll be widely distributed.
How do you counteract this trend?
- Remember that a client's gripe can go global and last forever.
- It might be wise to show testimonials on your site.
- Encourage happy customers to mention you in their blog.
Opportunity ?
There's also an opportunity in blogs. Lawrence Lessig says (Wired 11/2003 p.136) that grassroots blogs are transforming national politics, most notably for Howard Dean.
The Harvard Business Review's Sept 2003 article, Is There A Blogger in Your Midst? shows that employee blogging - while it's definitely outside of the comfort zone - can be very effective.
- Consider blogging yourself (make it a real blog, not an infomercial) or encourage some of your staff to blog.
- Read the Sept. 2003 Harvard Business Review article.
- Google your business name occasionally and see what's out there.
Click here for a Newsletter Index.
