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July 11, 2007
What I’ve Learned from Blogging
by Sridhar Ramanathan
Hard to believe that it’s been three years since Elise Bauer and I launched the Pacifica Group blog. Elise is, of course, light years ahead of me with her wildly successful recipe blog (Simply Recipes) which she started over four years ago. She was the one who inspired me (nay pushed) me to create the company blog, and I’ll be eternally grateful for that. So what have I learned from this experience?
The Benefits
- Improved writing skills and getting better all the time
- Credibility with clients -- both existing and prospective
- Relationship building with fellow consultants
- Repository for insights, information, and anecdotes
- Clarity of thought; writing forces rigor
- Attentiveness – the blog makes me constantly pay attention to what I’m learning and to scan for things that might interest my readers
The Struggles
- Maintaining morale when I don’t see comments on our posts
- Keeping up a pace of 1-2 entries per week was tough
- Not knowing who really reads the blog and whether it makes any difference
- Avoiding jargon; very easy to speak techno-babble in high tech marketing
- Making it edgy or controversial
- Spicing up the entries with interesting anecdotes, insights, etc.
The Lessons
- Blog when I have something to say rather than because I feel I need to post
- Write only on topics about which I am passionate and authoritative
- Write as if I’m sending an email to a friend or colleague; sprinkle with URLs
- Engaging in the conversation means I need to post comments on other blogs
- Takes less time than I thought (only couple hours a week)
- Measure blog impact by what clients/colleagues tell me not by number of posts
The Numbers
Just for fun I tried to benchmark the Pacifica Group blog against Guy Kawasaki’s blog (he’s written 8 books, is a former Apple exec and a renowned speaker).
- Page views = 400 per day (Kawasaki = 3588/day)
- Google page rank = 5 (Kawasaki= 7)
- Alexa rank =1,261,673 (Kawasaki= 9733)
- # sites that link to it = 18 (Kawasaki= 2487)
- Technorati rank = 456,599 (Kawasaki= 17)
So what does all this mean? I can look at the numbers and be depressed by how far I have to go to be in the same league as a Guy or I can just be satisfied with the more qualitative stuff. For example, it made my day when Scott Lutz, SAP executive in charge of their small-medium business (SMB) unit commented on my article on selling to small businesses. I feel great when client CEOs/execs tell me they forwarded an article to their staff or colleagues. Nevertheless, I see lots of room for improvement and vow to get better over time. The good news is that blogging is like any skill…you get better with practice.
The Invitation
If I can do it so can you. Elise will tell you that I was rather fearful when she first encouraged me to dump the Pacifica Group website (“brochure-ware” as she called it) and replace it with a blog. What could I possibly say that was worthy of publishing? Could I write well enough? Would I make a fool of myself relative to all the pundits out there? What would clients think of the posts? Would anyone care? These thoughts initially held me back. Thankfully, Elise persisted in her encouragement. So I’d sum up by saying go for it! Blogging is easy, effective, and worthwhile. And with all the conversations taking place in the blogosphere in your industry, you can’t afford not to go for it.
Resources
- Blogging for Business by Elise Bauer
- The Corporate Blogging Book by Debbie Weil
- Copyblogger by Brian Clark
Posted July 11, 2007 | Permalink
Posted to Marketing Management
Comments
Thanks for the suggestions Sridhar! We launched a Selling to Small Business Blog to give companies strategies to sell to the hard to reach small business community and I was pleased to see your post! If you are interested in being a guest blogger on our blog to discuss selling to small businesses, just email me!
Keep up the great work!
Evan.
Posted by: Evan Carmichael | July 16, 2007 8:21 AM
Hi Sridhar,
Congrats on your milestone.
I am one of the readers you were talking about, who started reading your blog after we met at an SDForum Marketing Event. I have started blogging only a year ago and that too not very often.
But what you say above is definitely true.
Keep it going.
-Radha.
Posted by: Radha Popuri | August 20, 2007 11:57 AM
Sridhar: Great post here. As you know, I have launched an IMC Northern California Chapter blog [Consultant's Corner] in an effort to help other consultants and IMC Norcal members get more engaged in the blogosphere.
I am going to post your comments here on our blog. Some excellent suggestions to share.
Posted by: Jeff Thompson | December 12, 2007 11:21 AM
Congrats on your 3-year milestone! Elise is an inspiration to many .. count me in as one of her 1# fans!
Posted by: Toby | July 12, 2007 8:33 PM