Blogs as Corporate Marketing Tools?
The Boston Globe's Hiawatha Bray says corporate America is increasingly using the weblog format as an internal information tool, allowing CEOs to better understand what their employees are thinking about, and as an external marketing tool. "It's a clever way to give Internet companies a human face. But is it really blogging? Sure, the corporate weblogs use the same technologies, but their hearts are not really in it," says Bray. "The best blogs don't just deliver authoritative information; they resonate with the personalities of their creators. How can any commercial or government agency match that?" He warns that external blogs aimed at customers "will quickly fall under the sway first of the company's marketing experts, then of its lawyers (and) the results will more often be little better than standard press releases."And, you know, he's right. It's inevitable.