Reading and Learning about Blogging and Podcasting - "Naked Conversations" - Part II
In Chapter 2 of the book Naked Conversations, the authors ask the question, "What is a blog and who cares?" They describe a blog as nothing more than a personal website, with content displayed in reverse chronological order, where new posts are placed at the top of the page instead of the bottom making it easy to see what has changed. In most cases, site visitors can identify the author and can leave comments for others to see. The blogs themselves are generally linked between each other by way of hyperlinks and, once you link to a blog, you are taken to other blogs in the global network called "blogosphere".
As the authors describe (at page 27), the most important aspect of the blog is that it is conversational, and while face-to-face meetings are a preferred route to go in communications, the reality is that it is impossible to make such meetings with every customer. The authors indicate that businesses essentially pursue the conversations because they build trust within their own organizations and with clients, customers and suppliers. The authors describe six key differences between blogging and other communication channels. These differences are as follows (page 28):
- 1. Publishable. Anyone can publish a blog. You can do it cheaply and post often. Each posting is instantly available worldwide.
- 2. Findable. Through search engines, people will find blogs by subject, by author, or both. The more you post, the more findable you become.
- 3.Social. The blogosphere is one big conversation. Interesting topical conversations move from site to site, linking to each other. Through blogs, people with shared interests build friendships unrestricted by geographic borders.
- 4. Viral. Information often spreads faster through blogs than via a news service. No form of viral marketing matches the speed and efficiency of a blog.
- 5. Syndicatable. By clicking on an icon, you can get free "home delivery" of RSS-enabled blogs. RSS lets you know when a blog you subscribe to is updated, saving you search time. This process is considerably more efficient than the last-generation method of visiting one page of one website at a time looking for changes.
- 6. Linkable. Because each blog can link to all others, every blogger has access to millions of other bloggers.
The authors note that you can find each of these elements elsewhere. None, however, in itself is all that remarkable, but the combination of them, plus the two-way Internet communication, is phenomenal. More to come on a later blog ...
All the best, Suzana and Ian. --------
