Content over Brand Wins Eyeballs

Great advice from AppsLab’s Jake Kuramoto on blogging:

I guess it’s striking to get a reminder that work I consider to be localized finds its way to the masses with the help of WordPress and Google. Today, my post about taking a screenshot on Android ranks fifth on Google for the keywords “android screenshot” and of course, by linking to it, I’ve raised the PostRank of this post.

The stark reminder here is that content matters more than brand. Note the fact that visits to our base page are less than half the visits to the Android screenshot post. The people who found that post don’t know who we are or what we do. All they know is the post either helped them answer a question or it didn’t. Then, they were gone like Kaiser Söze.

Read Jake’s entire post: http://theappslab.com/2011/01/09/why-arent-you-sharing-how-to-content

James McGovern on the evolution of blogging

Writing in his Enterprise Architecture blog, James McGovern makes an interesting and disappointing observation about the state of blogging.

Recently, I have noticed much of my stimulus has changed. The blogosphere is moving away from conversations and towards simply using it as a platform to communicate thinly veiled media relations sanitized press releases where all forms of communications are void of conversation.

I have no problem with marketing people adopting blogging and other social media tools.  But it drives me up the freakin' wall when I see exactly what James McGovern describes.  Ultimately, those who treat social media as a collection of new tools for the same old crap will fail. Good riddance.

Read: Enterprise Architecture: From Incite comes Insight...

 

Technorati Tags: blogging,social media,marketing,James McGovern.

A Future for Newspapers

Amid all the recent coverage of financial troubles at various newspapers, WSJ columnist L. Gordon Crovitz offers this:

One reason most media companies suspended normal business practices online, such as seeking subscription revenues, was a misinterpretation of one of the most powerful observations of the Information Age. When author Stewart Brand coined the expression "Information wants to be free," he focused on how technology makes it cheap and easy to communicate and share knowledge. But the rest of his quote is rarely noticed. This says, "Information also wants to be expensive." The right information in today's complex economy and society can make a huge difference in our professional and personal lives. Not having this information can also make a big difference, especially if someone else does have it. And for valuable information, online is a great new way for it to be valued.

I have subscriptions to the print editions of the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Cleveland Plain Dealer, though I most often read them online. My belief in and support of grassroots, social media-style journalism notwithstanding, newspapers still have a vital role to play, and I will happily pay for information that has value in my life.

Like any other business, however, newspapers must constantly strive for innovation in how they address the needs of their customers. If newspapers meet those needs, they should charge for that service. Their slice of the pie may be smaller, a factor that has already reshaped the industry and will continue to do so. But in age when we are awash in information, much of it of little consequence, the value of good information is at a premium, a premium that I'll happily pay.

 

Read the WSJ article: Information Wants to Be Expensive - WSJ.com

 

Technorati Tags: newspapers,wall street journal,L. Gordon Crovitz,new york times,cleveland plain dealer.

The Medium Ain't the Message

In a recent post about Twitter's inevitable infiltration into enterprise IT, RIA Developer's Journal blogger @strukoff hits on what has been my longstanding soapbox issue regarding the corporate use of social media:

But as with blogs, Twitter is now part of the enterprise IT discussion as well. Sure, most corporations blog about as creatively and effectively as members of the National People's Congress or the NCAA. But don't blame the medium, blame those who use it ineffectively.

My contribution to the Cleveland Social Media Club's upcoming eBook addresses this issue in  depth. 


In the meantime, read @strukoff's entire post:
SEO or SOA: Twittecdotes (Part II) | RIA Developer's Journal

Technorati Tags: socialmedia, blogging, twitter,

Blogging will survive

Among his predictions of 10 Things That WON'T Happen In 2009,  Information Week's Digital Life blogger Fredric Paul says that blogging isn't ready to go the way of the dodo:

DON'T expect blogging to be replaced by Twitter and Facebook and Flickr. There was a lot of talk in late 2008 about how blogging had become bloated, passe, corporate, and overrun with flame wars and spam. (True enough, I guess, except for this blog.) And that Facebook and Twitter and the like are faster, more direct and more personal. Also true enough, at least in some cases. But reports of blogging's death have been greatly exaggerated. If anything, 2009 will see even more blogging than 2008, even as alternative platforms grow even faster. The death of blogging will have to wait.

I use Twitter, and I have Facebook, Flickr, and YouTube accounts, each of which is, to varying degrees, an important resource in both my professional and personal lives.  But blogging  is the cornerstone of my Social Media practice, so Mr. Paul will get no argument from me.  Blogging isn't ready for a toe tag.

In fact, one could argue that blogging is the process one engages in when using any of those tools. Twitter is a mini blog. Flickr is photo blog, and YouTube a video blog. Facebook, in addition to being a kind of hybrid blog/IM platform, is also an aggregator for the content generated by or hosted on any of the other tools. So the blogging process is certainly evolving, but it's unlikely to fall victim to techno-Darwinism any time soon.

Technorati Tags: social media,informationWeek,blogging,facebook,twitter.

Techno//Marketer - Matt Dickman on Digital Marketing and Social Media: Five big social media contradictions and how to manage them

I am frequently asked for advice on blogging and the use of other social media tools in a  corporate marketing environment. Time and again I find myself either quoting Matt Dickman or referring people to his blog or presentations on SlideShare.

Matt's recent post on social media contradictions will certainly become one of those resources  I suggest to people who need help in learning to use these new tools.

Matt writes:

What's fast to build, slow to grow and needs constant attention? No, not a Chia Pet. It's social media! I've given this post a lot of thought over the past couple of months as I talk with executives and marketers who are discussing their entry into the social media space. Some are skeptical, others are passionate. Most have incorrect pre-conceived notions that are contradictory to the way things actually are. Ironically, most of these contradictions have been used as selling points in the early days of the space.

Read Matt's entire post: Techno//Marketer - Matt Dickman on Digital Marketing and Social Media: Five big social media contradictions and how to manage them

Technorati Tags: social media,blogging,Matt Dickman,marketing

Down, but not Out of Ideas in American Democracy

A story in yesterday's WSJ (Have a Laptop? You, Too, Can Sway New Hampshire Race)   presents an interesting illustration of the important role citizen journalists are playing in American politics:  

The Blue Hamsters, as the three bloggers sometimes call themselves and their readers, represent a new class of political amateurs who are changing the way information flows to activists. In Iowa, there's "Bleeding Heartland," a Democratic site founded by a college student. In Florida, Democratic bloggers recently formed the "Blog Florida Blue" coalition. Republicans are getting into the act, too, with sites like South Carolina's "Palmetto Scoop," which serves up bits of news.

The story is significant in that it offers insight into the important role these and similar bloggers play in keeping a channel open between voters and political candidates the mainstream media has already deemed less than worthy of the kind of coverage granted to front runners.  

These back-of-the-pack candidates may not have a realistic shot at the White House, but the MSM shirks its Fourth Estate responsibilities and does a disservice to voters by ignoring their ideas. 

As the front runners maneuver to be all things to all people, the others have little to lose by saying what they really think.

Dennis Kucinich, for instance, has no chance in hell of becoming President - and maybe that's a good thing. But he's also one of the few candidates to actually speak his mind. That kind of honesty is too often missing from a democratic process that for decades has all the political validity and relevance of American Idol.

Independent citizen journalists -- like those in the WSJ article, and the people connected with Cleveland's own Meet the Bloggers, represent a vital new platform, and an important  step toward real democracy. They fill the gap left by the MSM by providing a public platform for those whose willingness to express original, challenging ideas makes them both unelectable in an increasingly superficial political climate, and indispensable in a truly democratic process.

Technorati Tags: politics , democracy , blogs , blogging , citizen journalist , grassroots journalism