Previously in this series we published:
1) Lessons 1 – 4: Starting your blogging off on the right foot (2009-06-03)
2) Lessons 5 – 7: Setting the stage – ready – go (2009-06-03)
3) Lessons 8 – 11: Whatever domain, home you choose – beware (2009-07-08)
4) Lessons 12 – 13: Getting the basic SEO issues right (2009-07-08)

Today we release the last two installments of these tips and lessons, the fifth of which can be read here:
5) Lessons 14 – 17: Authenticity and quality are key

In this final post, the focus is on continuous improvement and exceeding good practice.

Lesson 18: No improvement without measurement
It is smart to benchmark but you should not begin until at least six months after the launch of the blog. For instance, we learned about changing our plugins the hard – and smart – way, as outlined in this post: WordPress plugins.

Improvements will only show over time and the first few months following the lessons we outlined in previous posts will bring more traffic. Nevertheless, mistakes happen and your team should learn from each one of them.

To see how well your blog strategy works register your blog here:
My.ComMetrics.com – benchmarking your blog – improve your score - sign-up for FREE

Lesson 19: Benchmark smartly
Some people suggest that regular benchmarking against others provides encouragement – a sort of benevolent peer pressure. While this helps, one of the smartest ways to benchmark is to benchmark against yourself. All things being equal, how much improvement occurred in your blogging between Q1 and Q2 of 2009 will tell you a lot about what works and what doesn’t. Answering this question will provide information that helps adjust and improve performance.

Comparing one’s blog against another similar blog (e.g., company of similar size, same country and industry) is an effective way to benchmark, gain insight and subsequently improve performance (see also social media – benchmarking the smart way – FAQ #2). We will start a new series on this topic next month: Benchmark smartly (first post in September 2009).

Lesson 20: Continuous improvement is key
Our work preparing the FT ComMetrics Blog Index (KISS the blog-bride) has taught us that successful corporate blogs try to continuously improve, which should be a great deal easier if you have addressed the issues covered by Lessons 3 and 4.

By its second year, a corporate blog should be posting regardless of vacations or holidays (see Lesson 14), and the authors should preferably have settled into their stride, yielding more interesting posts for the target-audience.

Improvements might also include new useful features or things that increase the blog’s user-friendliness. For instance, we decided to improve the content by getting professional editorial help – the result is before you: more concise and straight-talking posts …

P.S. – Don’t believe those that try to tell you that a corporate blog will help you make money quickly, since that is almost never the case for businesses (see why social media does not work this way). Nevertheless, remember that blogging is a very important channel for distributing information of value to stakeholders such as employees, customers, suppliers and investors.

Takeaways

Without measurement improvement is difficult – but make sure you pick smart benchmarks that yield actionable metrics.
Comparing against one’s own and similar blogs makes sense – compare apples to apples.
Improvement takes continuing and diligent efforts – don’t expect wonders in a month but budget at least a quarter and then check your trends.

I will keep it brief, love to dialogue more in the comments. What is your take? Please share.

Previously in this series we published:
1) Lessons 1 – 4: Starting your blogging off on the right foot (2009-06-03)
2) Lessons 5 – 7: Setting the stage – ready – go (2009-06-03)

Today we release the next two installments of these tips and lessons, the fourth of which can be read here:
3) Lessons 8 – 11: Whatever domain, home you choose – beware

The final set will come your way August 12:
5) Lessons 14 – 17: Authenticity and quality are key
6) Lessons 18 – 20: Improving blogging effectiveness

Corporate bloggers should follow these lessons to save on resources, money and improve blogging effectiveness. It actually takes little effort but the results are astonishing if you correct r completely avoid these mistakes.

To make sure that you don’t miss any of these upcoming posts, just leave your e-mail here:

Lesson 12: Manage your permalinks as effectively as possible
Make the permanent link to the blog post as informative as possible.

For example, the title of the post at
http://ftalphaville.ft.com/blog/2009/05/20/56072/dutch-courage-commodities-trading-edition/
is Dutch Courage Commodities Trading Edition.

For several reasons, we suggest using something more like
http://blogs.ft.com/alphaville/article/David Redmond-vs-FSA/
instead.

Our rationale for choosing the above is:

1. Using blog.FT.com indicates that this blog is hosted as a blog on the Financial Times’ homepage,
2. The blog’s name is Alphaville,
3. The word ‘article’ in the URL indicates that this is not a webpage, but a blog post; and
4. Using Redmond-vs-FSA at the end of the blog post’s permalink provides search engines with additional information beyond the title of the post, specifically that the post addresses an issue about somebody or someplace called Redmond and the financial regulator FSA.

Just a little adjustment that makes it that much easier for users and, as importantly, search engines to make more sense out of post titles with the help of the link itself. In turn, more interested readers visiting. That simple.

P.S. – Yes, some WordPress plugins are needed to do this.

To see how well your blog strategy works register your blog here:
My.ComMetrics.com – benchmark your blog – improve your score – sign up for FREE

Lesson 13: Using the right URLs
Besides being careful about the permalink structure (see above), linking pages and then changing the page structure on your blog can wreak havoc. For instance, pages detailing how to contact the company or its privacy policy are generally a permanent feature on your main blog page (in our case all pages are in the far right column).

With WordPress it is important to remember that its database assigns a number to any page, article or post. Hence, linking to a permanent page using a number for the blog post has some advantages.

The highlighted link to the right is shown as a nested link or sub-sub category to ‘10 – Rankings and trends’, which has the following link:
http://howto.commetrics.com/watch-the-direction/

Subsequent categories are FT ComMetrics Blog Index, which we abbreviated FTCBI, and then comes 2009 for the 2009 rankings:
http://howto.commetrics.com/watch-the-direction/ftcbi/2009/

We named the ComMetrics Footprint page ’standard’ and kept Google Blog Search to get the following deep link: http://howto.commetrics.com/watch-the-direction/ftcbi/2009/standard/google-blog-search/

However, if we change anything in our structure of how we list pages (e.g., shift Google Blog Search to be listed under ‘9 – Methodology’), the long URL no longer works.

Accordingly, since you might need to change the structure at a later date, using the ID number of the page as provided by WordPress decreases 404 error message occurrences.

If you go to the blog’s admin page –> pages –> choose any page –> click edit, the address bar will show a link like this:
http://howto.commetrics.com/wp-admin/page.php?action=edit&post=780

Grab the number and one gets
http://howto.commetrics.com/?page_id=780

Using this method of hyperlinking avoids problems in cases where you rearrange the structure, as occurred during recent spring cleaning on HowTo.ComMetrics.com.

This type of deep link will always bring up the page, regardless of where it may live within the structure.

Okay, now it’s your turn. What techniques you have used to improve your blogging effectiveness? What was your most successful “let’s do this and move on” tactic? If you have come close to resolving these challenges smartly, what did you do? Which of the above four strategies is your favorite? Which one do you think is just baloney? It’s okay – be honest. We can take it. Thanks much.

P.S. – You may find our next set of ropes to skip of interest as well: 5) Lessons 14 – 17: Authenticity and quality are key (2009-08-12).

This week’s best links pertaining to trends, research, privacy sales and environmental pollution refer to firms, cities and personalities like Calgary, George Soros, the US Federal Reserve System, Twitter, The Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital and the security problem with your Apple iPhone – patch available

Last week’s links you can find here: Very useful links: the Governator to Wal-Mart

Social Media MARKETING BUZZ
- Trends2Watch | Things2Read - The most livable city – Calgary, Melbourne, Zurich

- VERY USEFUL -  How to promote your eCommerce products |  #tips2follow

Trendwatch – WHITE PAPERS
- RFID Security and Privacy Lounge => 14 white papers added => free download #Things2read

- Computer Injuries -  #trends2watch US study 1994-2006 # of acute computer-related injuries went up 732% leading cause = kids 5yrs or younger & adults 60 yrs + older – 1st cause = tripping falling on computer equipment

Social Media TOOLS and GUIDES
- Carbon Footprint - calculate your country’s footprint online – shame on us #metrics2watch

- VERY USEFUL #trends2watch | 5 steps on how to ask for help on Twitter | YES it works => | #tips2follow #things2read

Economic CRISIS AND POLICY
- Transparency => US – The Federal Reserve System will be audited soon | #HR1207 #policy2watch

- Crisis – George Soros – My 3 steps to financial reform – systemic risk – bold decisions needed #policy2watch  #policy2watch

- UK, Spain …. house prices still dropping – afforability lower due to higher financing costs #trends2watch

- Metrics2watch hirings cut (inflow) & firings (outflows) up = greater unempl = recovery after 2009 chart

- Trends2watch - US oil imports dropped resulting in a lower current-account deficit of $101.5bn or 2.9% of GDP for 1stQ 09 lowest since 1st Q 2001 VIEW graphic

- Policy2watch- OECD – corporate governance & financial crisis - what must change read & watch video | #bettergovernance

- Regulatory Confusion | US financial system caught in regulatory web – illustrated with Citibank case study GRAPHIC – will systemic risk regulator help? #policy2watch

InfoSec
- US Homeland Security has a new blog – check it out #things2read #policy2watch #metrics2watch

- Apple iPhone OS 3.0 update – release addressing multiple vulnerability- make sure you have it —

My.ComMetrics.com

- Have you gotten your real-time alerts in the mail already? –  sign-in or register for free USE plus view June membership newsletter

Join our team - IT – be part of the excitement

More bookmarks: delicious.gattiker.name, or
Connect via: facebook.gattiker.name, friendfeed.gattiker.name, naijapulse.gattiker.name, twitter.gattiker.name

Okay, now it’s your turn. What important links to insights discussed in a blog post this week did we miss? Please add it below. Thanks much.

After publishing the 2009 FT ComMetrics Blog Index, which ranks FT Global 500 and Fortune 500 companies’ corporate blogs, some readers came forward asking for some tips on how to improve one’s ranking and statistics.

Can we help? Definitely! We have developed some best practices, as outlined below in a series of posts.

Today we release the first two installments of these tips and lessons, the first of which can be read here:

1) Lessons 1 – 4: Starting your blogging off on the right foot (2009-06-03)

The next set will be published July 8:
3) Lessons  8 – 11: Whatever domain, home you choose – beware
4) Lessons 12 – 13: Getting the basic SEO issues right

The final set will come your way August 12:
5) Lessons 14 – 17: Authenticity and quality are key
6) Lessons 18 – 20: Improving blogging effectiveness

To make sure that you don’t miss any of these upcoming posts, just leave your e-mail here:

Lesson 5: Describe the value-potential for your proposed target audience
Defining the type of blog one is after (Lesson 2),  target audience one is aiming for (Lesson 3), as well as the focus of two-thirds of the content on your blog (Lesson 4) are all crucial first steps.

Here the focus is on why anybody would want to read your blog, instead of going to the beach or getting another customer to sign on the dotted line.

Google may have a blog I need to read because it provides 80 percent of my webpage’s search traffic – if it changes something in its technology that will affect my blog’s traffic I need to know right away.

The issue is also whether one reads the blog for entertainment value (e.g., a blog about one’s favorite online game, gossip blog about sitcom TV show, etc.), professional purposes (e.g., keeping abreast of the latest developments in one’s industry) or some other reason. A corporate blog can probably serve either group. Nevertheless, the key question is how it will help you sell more product or build the corporation’s reputation, visibility, brand and trust. Jot down a few sentences and see if your thoughts make sense to other team members.

Lesson 6 – define which strategic objectives can be supported by the blog
Make clear whether the blog is supposed to support sales or help build greater visibility for the brand.

GM is trying to make sure that no unsubstantiated rumors make the news, which serves the sole purpose of defusing rumors and correcting misstated facts as quickly as possible.

GM’s ‘tell it straight’ blog was intended to make sure that the world, including customers, taxpayers and investors, got the facts about its business negotiations before filing for bankruptcy protection in the US. Its primary focus is helping the firm survive in one form or another by getting the company’s viewpoint across. Most people would agree it has succeeded.

Lesson 7: Define which actionable metrics will be applied based on rules 1-6

To see how well your blog measures with these actionable metrics register your blog here:

My.ComMetrics.com – benchmarking your blog – sign up for FREE

An example of actionable metrics is when getting information that triggers a decision or action, such as finding out that one train to Point B departs at 8:05 and the next at 9:05. Depending on which train is chosen, one must leave home at a certain time to get to the station in time. The information is the basis on which the user makes a decision and takes action based on that decision. In business, failing to meet sales figures this quarter may result in the company deciding to put its workforce on a shorter work week for next quarter.

Besides following the KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) principle, for a blog this means one needs SMART (Specific, Manageable, Actionable, Relevant, Trending) metrics for web and blog analytics. Accordingly, unless a drop in unique visitors last month results in some action to counter this effect why use this metric (Unique visitors come in many guises)? In fact, less traffic on a blog could be worth more in the end – if it’s the right kind of traffic (e.g., people feeling okay to buy product).

These days we tend to have too many metrics that are not used to make choices or decisions that result in actions to remedy the problem (see also Social media – metrics to know and metrics to skip – FAQ #2). Instead, it is smarter to focus on a  few indicators that result in actions, depending on the data one gets. Examples are:

the ComMetrics Footprint (see 2009 FT ComMetrics Blog Index),
the ComMetrics Health Check, and
the ComMetrics Return on Connection.

Composite indicators have their weaknesses but they are widely used for various reasons including, but not limited to, simplifying complex issues.

Okay, now it’s your turn. What techniques you have used in improving blogging effectiveness? What was your most successful “let’s do this and move on” tactic? If you have come close to resolving these challenges smartly, what did you do? Which of the above four strategies is your favorite? Which one do you think is just baloney? It’s okay – be honest. We can take it. Thanks much.

P.S. – Of interest to you would be our next set of ropes to skip: 3) Lessons 8 – 11: Whatever domain or home you choose – beware (2009-07-08).

How do you rank compared to your competitors? This question is answered in part by the FT ComMetrics Blog Index, which ranks FT Global 500 and Fortune 500 firms’ corporate blogs. It will appear in the Financial Times newspaper’s regular supplement on Digital Business as well as on its webpage on Thursday, May 14.

In the never-ending quest to get the biggest bag for your buck and move up the rankings to become part of the best-in-class, there are some mistakes that must be avoided at all costs.

The Good
We discovered the good while developing the FT ComMetrics Blog Index, meaning that corporate blogs are improving rapidly and many positive changes have occurred within the last few months. Most companies have done a lot of exciting work on improving their blogs, fostering communication and targeting their primary audience effectively.

The Bad
Building a large footprint remains a challenge. But most surprising is when companies make it very difficult for potential readers to find a blog. For example, finding anything about their blog on the Volvo bus webpage is difficult. If you’re lucky, you might come across a special page that shows a link to the blog. This seems a bit unnecessary.

On top of all this, the blog’s URL is complicated and has nothing to do with the corporate domain. This affects various statistical indicators that depend on the URL used, such as using the most obvious link results in these search results from Yahoo InLinks. Using a slightly different link shows more Yahoo! InLinks and so forth. No obvious links to a corporate blog can also affect its rankings in the search results as shown here.

The findings show that a simple, straight-forward link to reach the blog’s main page, such as blog.company.com, is a wise strategy.

The Ugly
A most unfortunate situation is when, for no apparent reason, a blog shifts its home on the Internet. One example is the Toyota Open Road Blog, whose new home is now on the Toyota website. Unfortunately, this meant its URL changed (see old blog posts in the Internet archive), making it harder to find for those using old directions.

While the blog previously had a large footprint, changing its URL meant it lost a lot of links and its footprint shrank significantly. Google PageRank, Technorati Ranking, Technorati Authority, Yahoo! InLinks and Google Blog Search as well as ComMetrics Footprint rankings have tumbled due to the blog’s changing URL.

Moving up in the rankings after falling into a crevice can be a near-impossible climb. Hence, by wisely choosing one’s blog URL in the beginning to avoid changing it will save you a lot of grief and money.

Bottom line
Following the KISS – Keep It Simple, Stupid - principle, blog URLs should be made simple for robots and humans to find your blog estate without having to jump through hoops.  And changing a blog’s URL after attaining impressive rankings is neither effective nor does it help save resources in these tough economic times. In fact, it will take much effort and resources to climb up the charts after the inevitable fall.

A smart example is eBay and its Skype brand. All blogs are hosted under share.skype.com/, which gets a Google PageRank of 7. All blogs are located on
share.skype.com/sites/, which has a Google PageRank of 6. The latter is the rank Google gives all Skype blogs, including share.skype.com/sites/en/, share.skype.com/sites/de/ and share.skype.com/sites/jp/.

Differences start with Technorati Authority, Technorati Ranking and Yahoo! InLinks, where the English blog seems to do slightly better. This happens with other firms as well, such as Nokia, whose English blogs do far better (see the 2009 FT ComMetrics Blog Index) than those in other languages (an issue to be addressed at another time).

Our question to readers is, what is your opinion? Please share your thoughts and insights on this important issue by leaving a comment. Thank you.

Find out more about the  FT ComMetrics Blog Index using these links: Leaders by metric, What is top class, Methodology, Good and best practice, Lessons learned, Trends to watch, Your own index report, Free download: PDF report

Destroying brand value is not difficult: all it takes is relentlessly disappointing expectations. Kleenex, Fortis, L’Oréal, Motorola and BAE have all chosen to pass up the opportunity offered by blogging to secure themselves a new lease on life during this recession. In fact, these brands have decided to shut down blogs that had substantial numbers of followers.

In this post we share some of the things we discovered while working on the FT ComMetrics Blog Index. The latter will appear in the Financial Times newspaper’s regular Digital Business supplement and its webpage (www.ft.com/digitalbusiness) on Thursday, May 14.

Does it matter?
The lessons or ropes to skip listed below are not in any particular order of importance. Some of them may be familiar and others may be new to readers. Regardless, they all are important and avoiding these mistakes will minimize your company’s waste of valuable resources while at the same time improving your blogging effectiveness.

Lesson 1 – building a relationship and having a conversation takes time. Of course, we all know this. Nonetheless, L’Oréal’s Vichy brand tried to do this in just four weeks; thereafter the blog was basically shut down.

Unfortunately, blogging effectively requires that one stick to one’s guns for at least 12 months. Plus, regularly posting content that is of interest to one’s target audience is key.

Lesson 2 – it is not just about selling. On the flip side of Vichy, Kleenex launched a blog site as part of the advertising campaign for one of its products, but after a few months the blog was taken offline.

The Kleenex example illustrates that using a corporate blog just to push a product may fail to secure customer trust and confidence in the brand. In fact, it may hurt your brand more than doing nothing at all.

Lesson 3 – a corporate blog should be linked to a topic, issue or group of people. Some companies allow an employee to blog about a particular topic. Unfortunately, this can result in a blog’s sudden death once this person leaves the organisation, as illustrated by the BAE Systems Graduate blogs.

There are two ways to reduce this risk. First, several people could provide content for a blog about a specific topic, such as career management. Second, a category about career management could be made part of a blog with several employees posting content in it as illustrated by the Beruf und Karriere category on Daimler’s blog.

Lesson 4 – lean times demand that this medium be used effectively. So a company followed the above steps, and painstakingly managed to create trust with clients who read the blog and participate in the conversation. Despite that previous effort, while putting together the FT ComMetrics Blog Index, our crawlers discovered more than one blog that had been taken offline, such as Motorola’s effort. Fortis also made a misstep: they used to run a great blog for start-ups and entrepreneurs (http://www.join2grow.biz/Magazine.aspx) with a dedicated following, but just as the sale of Fortis Bank to BNP Paribas was imminent, the blog was taken offline. Neither the old or new ‘owners’ felt the need to explain this action to the blog’s loyal followers and readers.

So maybe the product no longer exists or corporate strategy changed. But why throw the baby out with the bathwater and take a successful blog offline? What about all those dedicated readers of the RSS feed and/or subscribers for the blog’s new posts via e-mail? Why lose them? Could the blog be kept alive while still resonating with consumers or clients?

Bottom line
During an economic downturn, more emphasis should be given to effective communications media, including blogs.

We suggest following these four lessons and providing content that readers consider valuable. In contrast to an advertising campaign that will eventually stop, a blog can change slightly over time but is an effective way to help your brand and provide target customers with content they find useful.

Putting the consumer first is surely important, but expecting everything after that to just fall into place is plain naive. And making mistakes as those discussed above will make things unnecessarily difficult for your brand. Those who aspire to build and maintain global awareness would do well to bear in mind that the success of global powerhouse brands is based in large part on making effective use of social media. Dedicated readers of corporate blogs are not only a resource of knowledge but also of inspiration that should be treated with respect. Failing to do so may cause unnecessary damage to your brand.

What is your take on other brands’ blogging performance? Are there others like Kleenex, Fortis, Motorola and Vichy who got it wrong or more who got it right? Please share your thoughts and insights on this important issue by leaving a comment. Thank you.

Last Saturday I attended Switzerland’s BlogCamp 4 in Zurich, my first time at a barcamp (how it works). Below I discuss some of the impressions, ideas and insights gained during the day-long event, which included several streams with presentations. The summary below reflects the sessions I attended, but you can find more information in German here:

– Switzerland BlogCamp 4 summary by Annubis
- Switzerland BlogCamp 4 summary by Hagen Graf
- Switzerland BlogCamp 4 – presentation Dominik Allemann – how to manage comments effectively
- Switzerland BlogCamp 4 – presentation by Ralph – Twitter how-to for beginners

So here comes my review of the event.

Multi-thematic versus mono-thematic blogging
I started my day with a presentation from the Gedankenblitze Blogger. Among other things, he pointed out that a mono-thematic blog may be a niche blog for experts. In turn, this requires the blogger to provide in-depth content in order to satisfy that type of reader.

Lesson 1➡ Deciding to run either a mono-thematic or a multi-thematic blog is critical to map out a path to success – ideally before one starts blogging. Once the decision is made, you have to stick to your guns and post accordingly.

Be careful about changes
As an extension of Lesson 1, remember that when a member uses something daily (e.g., Twitter or My.ComMetrics.com), for better or worse, any change (e.g., user interface) will cause complaints from some people. Members get used to how things feel, interact and look, so change is not always appreciated. This also applies to blogs.

During my presentation about My.ComMetrics.com, delegates raised valuable points about where the user spends the most time. For instance, the home page of the blog or the product detail page of a web-based software are more important than any other. Get the slides here: download presentation.

Lesson 2➡ Make sure the product is presented and explained in a way that makes big changes after the product-release unnecessary – people do not necessarily like change.

New media – much changed but more stayed the same
Juerg Vollmer from Krusenstern talked about the social media newsroom. He started off by summarizing changes in how news content is made and distributed thanks to viral marketing, bloggers, social networks and the micro-blogging platforms, including but not limited to Naijapulse, which is open-source software.

While studying the author’s blog post regarding his social media newsroom presentation, two things became clear:

1) using bullets and short paragraphs to structure the written message is important, and
2) inserting slides, images and videos in a blog post can be helpful.

Lesson 3➡ Today’s social media user wants well-structured content that allows for scanning. Slides, videos, tweets and images can enhance the message but not enough to make understanding it harder.

Effective system management, SEO and more
The last presentation I chose was given by Patrick C. Price and focused on SEO issues, particularly regarding WordPress. It was so interesting and raised so many questions for participants that it ran over time, and instead of attending the closing session, a few stayed back to continue the session with Price.

Lesson 4➡ Running several blogs makes using WordPress’ multi-user software an effective choice, while using a few widgets and add-ons fosters better user-friendliness.

We hope to acquire Price’s presentation slides soon, so we can provide you with a link for downloading.

Proper copy-editing is a big part of reputation management
BlogCamp 4 also demonstrates that a blog represents one’s personal brand, which also influences one’s reputation. Therefore, this work deserves close attention to assure quality, including editing for flow, proper spelling and grammar, as well as fact-checking before publishing content.

Being sloppy may suggest to readers, who are all potential clients or employers, that one works in a similar way.

Until recently, we were one of the micro businesses that did not use the necessary resources to improve, but that has changed. BlogCamp 4 confirmed our belief in the importance of such maintenance. In fact, some of our blog readers have mentioned how much things have changed since Christmas 2008, when we splurged on a gift for ourselves and hired an in-house editor.

Lesson 5➡ Write succinctly, clearly and without errors that could detract from your important message … Blogging is an important part of image-, brand- and reputation-building. Stop wasting it by being too cavalier about typos and factual errors, etc.

On a more personal note, BlogCamp 5 has at least one confirmed attendee from ComMetrics. We would not want to miss out on this important opportunity to meet bright people who willingly share their know-how with peers. The experience was exhilarating and stimulating, with one exception: lunch in the ETH cafeteria. Then again, nothing and no one is perfect.

commetrics @phogenkamp and TEAM thanks for organizing #bcch4 | what a blast

What are your experiences with barcamps; care to share by leaving a comment? I look forward to reading your insights. Thanks in advance.