Blogging as a Marketing Tool

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Published August 26th, 2008 in Corporate Blogging

Companies are starting to realize exactly how powerful blogs can be, especailly as marketing tools. According to Geoff Livingston, a PR strategist and social media expert, “It’s a phenomenal promotion vehicle for a company, or a great crisis tool or a great customer service tool.” Microsoft is using a blog for Windows 7 with the hopes of building an overall better product that satisifes customer needs and wants. In fact, there are a lot of fortune 500 companies that are using blogs to engage with and interact with their users. Some of the fortune 500 companies with blogs include:

Sun Microsystems
GM
Cisco
Raytheon
Oracle
Starbucks
IBM
FedEx
and many others

An article by the Washington Post quotes Bill Marriott as saying: “that’s the importance of public relations, of advertising, of everything we do and this [blog] is just another channel.” A blog also shows the personal side of a company leader. People like and appreciate the human side of corporate America. It’s not always about business and when a company leader opens up a bit, readers respect that.

A blog is indeed a powerful medium with many benefits such as:

allowing readers or prospective employees get a sense of the corporate culture or work environment
creating an online presence that builds brand equity and awareness
allowing readers to post feedback directly on issues or features that they may or may not like
shows the personal side of a company or a company leader
let’s companies and individuals build quality relationships with loyal readers or users
allows companies or individuals to make important news or event announcements

These are just a few of the many ways that companies can use a blog as a valuable marketing and relationship building tool.