Business Blogging Still Rare: Summer Days Still Hot

Got a heads up e-mail from a friend about a new piece in e-Marketer. The article say Business Blogging is still rare, and most of the people with blogs aren't satisfied with the results.

There are plenty of business-blog skeptics in the US as well, according to studies by Socialtext and eMarketer. Less than 6% of the Fortune 500 and 2% of the Forbes 200 Best Small Companies blogged in April and June 2006, respectively.

One of the major reasons that companies are dissatisfied with their business blogs is a lack of focus in their use. If you ask a company what their blog does, you'll mostly get back "soft" answers about communicating with your customers and being part of the Web 2.0 paradigm. The truth is that most corporate blogs are there because someone decided they needed a blog.

It's hardly surprising that they don't like the results.

Other companies have blog committees in place, but the difficulty of making the blog a catch-all for every executive who wants to be involved holds back the effectiveness of the blogging.

And then there's the lawyers, who view blogs as evidence and aren't willing to expose the company to risk.

So when my friend sent me the note - it actually made me feel good. My clients are happy with their blogs. It does what we said it would do. And as long as they keep at it - they see results. In fact, I don't have a single client who stuck with their blogging who hasn't seen some surprising results, in terms of traffic, recognition, and yes, revenue.

So I look at the 6% figure and say "Great!" That's a big audience, and I'm going to be one of the first to crack it.