Mario Sundar's Speakeasy

A trip down memory lane. In November 2005, Harvard Business School outlined the benefits of corporate blogging in a Harvard Management Communication Letter:

…the school said blogs enable the brave few “to connect with customers online and advance corporate communications and marketing goals” and added that a well-written blog can boost a company’s credibility.

The letter is also said to have highlighted three tips on corporate blogging, which echoes many of our posts on corporate blogging best practices since then. These were HBS’ suggestions:

1. Blogs as crisis management tools

In the case of crisis – far from being a PR disaster – a blog can enable companies “to shape the conversation about it”, the article states.

2. Allow comments – positive and negative

Permit both positive and negative posts on your blog and reply to comments made on other blogs pertinent to your area of focus. Respond in a professional and businesslike way. If you don’t want to hear from your customers and critics in a public environment, don’t blog.

3. Blog often

And most importantly, the article tells companies to make a commitment to update the blog regularly once they have told the world they are doing a blog.

It’s interesting to see how far we’ve come since then but it’s still many months; maybe years, before corporate blogging becomes standard practice. How long before that happens?

Only time will tell. But rest assured; you’ll learn it first here!

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Filed under: Business Blogging