Home

Edition 7 - May 2005

How to Incorporate Weblogs into your PR Strategy

Blogs: effective generation of grassroots support

Web logs - better known as blogs - are websites written by one person that allow the author the freedom to express uninhibited opinions in a public forum. Blogs are typically updated daily and reflect the personality of the author and are usually written in the style of a journal or diary. Topics range from politics to gardening; from serious social commentary to stand-up comedy. Some blogs stick to one topic; other bloggers write about a different topic every day with nothing tying the topics together other than their own thoughts and experiences.

Most web logs consist of journal entries listed in reverse chronological order, and include links to relevant articles, websites and other web logs. This interconnection between the thousands of web logs on the Internet is known as the "blogosphere".

Bloggers have a loyal community and work hard to protect and promote one another, and blogs have become a mechanism for disseminating information, stimulating discussion, and generating grassroots support. Blogs thus represent a new communications channel and offer companies a new method to communicate messages and improve internal and external communications.

Blogs can impact a public relations strategy in a variety of ways. A blog may not be read by millions, but its influence on mainstream media can be powerful, according to respected journalists like Dan Gillmor, a technology columnist in Silicon Valley.

"Any reporter with a brain is reading blogs. No matter what the beat, you're missing something if you're not reading blogs and grass-level journalism. Journalists are actually getting a lot of scoops because it's not a traditional channel," he says.

As well as following blogs for story ideas and trends, a number of journalists write their own blogs to distribute information which does not appear in their traditional publications directly to consumers.

Blogs are also a great way for companies to speak directly to consumers: an increasingly important strategy in this age of "participatory citizen journalism." In fact, one recent survey found that many consumers who regularly read blogs now believe what they read in a blog as much or more than what they read in their local newspaper or see on television.

Corporate web logs are also starting to have an impact. Employees who blog on their particular areas of expertise can demonstrate thought leadership and industry expertise. Web logs can be tremendous buzz generators, and in today's competitive environment, brands can't afford to turn down any opportunity to create a greater sense of connection with their target audiences.

Many forward-thinking companies encourage their employees to interact with customers via their blogs, and some have implemented corporate blogging policies to ensure employees know what is permissible to say and do online on behalf of their organisations.

At Microsoft, where more than 700 employees have personal blogs, the company does not enforce formal guidelines, but does loosely monitor the sites. The company has hosted an employee forum to discuss corporate blogging, and suggests employees make it clear that the views expressed in their blogs are their own, not those of the company.

Even senior executives have joined the blogging community, establishing their own web logs to share insight and vision with employees and a broader online community. An executive blog is an excellent way to share thoughts, ideas and perspectives from an organisation's leadership with the media, customers and employees, in a tone that is personal, informal and engaging.

Bloggers differ from the mainstream media because they have no deadlines to meet; no advertisers to please; no restrictive word count; no circulation goals to hit; and no lawyers to quell their pens.

There is a need for extreme caution when approaching blogs for coverage. The golden rules are:

Many bloggers took up blogging to avoid PR-generated stories and other corporate sponsored fodder, so it can be an uphill battle to work with them. Only honest, legitimate and knowledgeable outreach should be attempted.

We also need to be aware of the possibility of negative coverage in blogs as a result of clumsy efforts to sell in a story. A blog's content is pure. Any defamation of this purity subverts the intent of the blog's existence, and any act perceived to be a threat to this purity will be ignored, or worse, publicly scorned.

Blogs are, however, a great and largely untapped PR opportunity. A recent poll of 610 bloggers found that although 74 per cent are open to receiving information from companies and organisations, 91 per cent have never been approached. As with any PR effort, understand you can't control what bloggers say. Their brutal honesty is what appeals to their readers, after all.

The blogging community at large is also very sensitive to "astroturfing" - the practice of cooking up a grassroots campaign or story ideas where none exists. This could cause a major backlash, including a call to boycott products or services.

The Weber Shandwick web relations practice in the US has built a comprehensive database of the most popular blogs broken down by industry category and contact and how they like to interact with PR professionals. We have been building relationships with influential bloggers for several years and understand the most effective ways to work with this new medium to communicate messages.

While the risks of pitching blogs may be greater than the risks of pitching traditional media, the payoff can be significant. With a little knowledge about which blogs are influential, and how to go about working with them, a well-thought-out "blog-relations" campaign can be an effective element of a communications strategy.


By Mike Spataro, executive vice president of the Weber Shandwick web relations practice, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

 

 

© 2005 Weber Shandwick