Studies show that web page  views have been dropping precipitously as folks park themselves on the social web. There have even been a flurry of blog posts from Jason Falls, Jay Baer and Debbie Weil debating whether your blog is now the true “hub” of your marketing communication effort.

But honestly, it seems strange to me that these superb bloggers are even wasting space with this debate. Your good old website (Ahhhh … remember that?) is still your hub.  Here’s why.

What are you really trying to do?

Step away from your Tweetdeck, take a deep breath, and think about what behavior you are trying to drive with your communication effort. In most cases it is making some type of connection, right? Let’s just be honest and put the purist stuff aside. Ultimately you want your readers to take an ACTION like register for something, make a call, or buy something from you.

Is that going to happen on your blog?

Probably not, unless you are doing out-right selling there and that’s (usually) a no-no.  The actual “connection event” is going to happen on your website. So all roads should lead to your homepage, right?  Wouldn’t that make it the very epicenter of your marketing universe?

Even though websites seem to be out of fashion, they still play a critical role in actually driving behaviors. A website should explain what you do, why you’re special, and what a reader should do next.  This is where you sell. And that’s a big deal.

Creating the spokes

You need to use the social web to support this effort by creating an “information eco-system” to lead prospective stakeholders back to the Mother Ship and eventually DO SOMETHING. You can think of these outposts on Twitter, your blog, Facebook, YouTube or wherever as spokes or outposts leading your visitors home.  Likewise, your website should also be leading people back to the outposts, if that is where they need to be to get the information they need.

Whether you work for a non-profit, a university, or a business, you’re in this to drive some type of behavior. That behavior is consummated on the website (usually a contact page) and all social properties should point to your site and your opportunity. Your website still matters … a lot!

What am I missing here?

{grow} community update: Dave Fleet posted an article which serves as a nice reference if you’re interested in reading more on this topic.

A new study of the world’s 500 largest public corporations by the University of Massachusetts Center for Marketing Research indicates that the level of corporate blogging may have flat-lined while the adoption of of other social media platforms, especially Twitter, continues to escalate rapidly.

Corporate blogging

Of the Fortune 500 companies, 22%, have a public-facing blog with a post in the past 12 months, including three of the top five companies (Wal-Mart, Chevron and General Electric).  That’s up just 6% from a 2008 study.

Rank on the Fortune 500 list seemed to influence the adoption of blogging by the F500. The top 100 companies (or to 20%) on the list represent 39% of the 108 blogs.

All 108 blogs were examined to determine the level of interactivity the blog allowed — 90% percent of the Fortune 500 blogs take comments, have RSS feeds and take subscriptions.

Twitter

Of the 108 blogs located, 93 (86%) are linked directly to a corporate Twitter account, a more than 300% increase over the 2008 study.

173 (35%) of the primary corporations listed on the 2009 Fortune 500 have a Twitter account with a post within the past 30 days. Of these companies, four of the top five corporations (Wal-Mart, Chevron, ConocoPhillips and General Electric) consistently post on their Twitter accounts. For more on GE’s social media efforts: click here.

Podcasting and video

The 2009 Fortune 500 were also examined to determine usage of additional social media tools. 19% of the 2009 Fortune 500 use podcasting (up from 16%) and 31% are using video on their blog sites (up from 21%).

Implications

While blogging has more or less flat-lined for the mega-companies, a recent article I posted on the fast-growing Inc. 500 corporations showed a much higher rate of adoption. In fact, nearly half of the Inc. 500 had corporate blogs compared to 22% for the Fortune 500.  What could this mean? I guess you would expect smaller companies to be fleeter in adopting new ideas, but blogging isn’t that new.  Besides, the incredible adoption of Twitter demonstrates that the Fortune 500’s do have at least some understanding of the social web.

I have experienced first-hand how difficult it is to manage a meaningful blog in a public company straddled with so many laws and regulations. It’s hard to be responsive and authentic when you have to get everything reviewed by the legal department.  I’m guessing that many companies are experiencing the same angst –   What is the role of a blog in the corporate communications structure?  What are the benefits versus the cost of approvals and the time needed from executives to sponsor the work?  And just how many blogs does the world need any way?  Does the heightened use of video and podcasting indicate companies are turning to new means of expression?

What do you think?  Has corporate blogging reached its saturation point?

{grow} community alert: Jon Buscall has written a wonderful companion piece that actually answers the questions I pose here!

Many thanks to Nora Barnes and Eric Mattson for their detailed and important research.

Illustration: Web Tycoon

A brand new study from the University of Massachusetts Center for Marketing Research  compares adoption of social media over three years (2007-2009) by the Inc. 500, a list of the fastest-growing private U.S. companies.  

In 2007, the Center’s first study of this group was released and revealed that the Inc. 500 was outpacing the Fortune 500 companies in their use of social media. For example, 8 percent of the Fortune 500 companies were blogging compared to 19 percent of the Inc. 500. This difference accelerated in 2008 with 16 percent of the Fortune 500 blogging vs. 39 percent of the Inc. 500. And in 2009, it was 45 percent versus 22 percent fo the Big Boys.  

This research shows that social media has penetrated this part of the business world with tremendous speed: 

Not just for customers and employees – As the graph above depicts, many companies are using the social platforms to connect to other stakeholders such as vendors and business partners. This was a new question for 2009 and the first time I have seen this kind of data. Interesting! 

Social media marketing has been “successful” – When asked if the use of social media has been successful for their business, the overwhelming response is that it has. Twitter users report an 82% success rate while every other tool studied enjoys at least an 87% success level. Measuring success was investigated and most respondents report using hits, comments, leads or sales as primary indicators. 

Policy use still low –  61 percent of the respondents did NOT have a corporate social media policy 

Importance and adoption — When queried on the importance of social media, 44% of respondents felt that social media is “very important” to their business and marketing strategy, up from 26 percent.  And a walloping 91 percent of the Inc. 500 is using at least one social media tool in 2009 (up from 77 percent in 2008). 

Monitoring gains –  68 percent of the companies formally monitor company and brand information on the social web.  That number is up from 60% in 2008 and 50% just two years ago. 

Further immersion –  The companies clearly intend to continue immersing themselves in these tools.  44 percent of those without corporate blogs intend to have one. 27 percent of respondents who do not currently have a business presence on Twitter plan to move into that space. 

Social networking leads –  The technology that continues to be the most familiar to the Inc. 500 is social networking with 75 percent of respondents in 2009 claiming to be “very familiar with it” (compared to 57 percent in 2008). Another noteworthy statistic around familiarity is Twitter’s amazing “share of mind” with 62 percent of executives reported being familiar with the new microblogging and social networking platform. 

Adoption curves for social media technologies vary –  Interestingly, while social networking and blogging have enjoyed growth in actual adoption, the use of message boards, online video, wikis and podcasting has leveled off or even declined. The addition of Twitter for the first time in the latest study shows that an amazing 52 percent of the Inc. 500 companies are already using this tool for business. 

What stands out for you in this research? Any big surprises? Or is it ALL a surprise? : ) 

Many thanks to the authors of this study, Dr. Nora Ganim Barnes,  and Eric Mattson.

This is the third and final (for now) personal case study on how the social web delivers unexpected business benefits. This story features LinkedIn, a powerhouse generator of business connections.  

Making connections

I’ve made some of my best business contacts through LinkedIn Group Q&A forums. One example is my relationship with Dr. Ben Hanna, now VP of Dex Interactive. In a casual response to one of my answers in a forum, he mentioned that he was documenting his company’s progress on social media marketing month by month. I thought this was fascinating and asked if I could feature him on {grow}.  This led to a number of articles which remain some of the most popular posts I’ve done.  Ben and I have continued to support each other on various web-related projects.

Human Resources 2.0

Second example of a business benefit: One of my customers was looking to hire a new technician with highly specialized skills. I suggested doing an advanced search on LinkedIn using the zip code (to narrow the location) and keywords indicating the skill set. He followed my advice, identified three viable candidates and he just hired one of them.  I helped my customer with an important personnel issue in one 60-second phone call!

New customers

Another example led to a direct business opportunity.  An account executive from GIS Planning read some of my answers on a LinkedIn Group Forum and became curious enough to click my icon, which took her to my website … which took her to my Twitter account … and my blog.  Of course I had not connected to her directly at this point but that was about to change.

After a couple of months, she called me up out of the blue: “Mr. Schaefer, I’ve been reading your comments on LinkedIn, Twitter and your blog and I’m convinced you are the voice of marketing we need for or company. Can you take on a new account?”

Well, THAT was a nice surprise!

This led to subsequent phone calls with her executive leadership and it resulted in a business partnership with GIS Planning, an amazing company that produces software for economic development institutions.  It pulled me into a whole new industry and allowed me to learn from some wonderful marketing pros.  And, it has helped my bottom line, which is what this is all about, right?

So let’s see how this real-world experience relates to my formula for creating business benefits on the social web: 

Connections + Meaningful content + Authentic helpfulness = Business benefits

• By being active on LinkedIn forums, I was building important new business connections. In the GIS case, I didn’t even realize it.
• The content Ben Hanna provided spurred dialogue and cooperation between us.  Meaningful content in the form of LinkedIn Group answers provided enough value for GIS to take action to learn more about me. Meaningful content comes in many forms!
• When I was participating in the forums, I was genuinely offering help with no intent that I would get anything out of it. Similarly, I enjoy supporting Ben’s projects becuase I always learn something and I truly believe in his vision.

I believe this formula represents the core value of the social web — providing an opportunity to use your life’s blessings to connect to others in a meaningful way. We are living in a historic moment. We are the first generation to have access to free, instantaneous, global communication.  If you use this gift well, the benefits can be astounding.

Don’t you agree?

This is the third installment of the unexpected benefits of the social web. You might enjoy these other articles:

Part 1: How to become a CMO in 10 tweets or less

Part 2: On Twitter, even casual connections can lead to business benefits

This week, I’m featuring personal case studies to demonstrate how the social web can provide tremendous business benefits … often when you least expect it!

Today’s example started when I tweeted ”Go Steelers!” … and ended with the video about my business that you can view by clicking the image above.

I was watching a Monday night football game and tackling a little work at the same time. I flipped to Twitter and cheered for my favorite team. “I’m cheering for the Steelers, too” Michelle Chmielewski tweeted back.  And soon we were sharing our love for football, Pittsburgh (where she was a student), and blogging.

I had never connected with her before but Michelle had been reading {grow} and had just started to blog herself,  The Observing Participant.  As a new blogger, she asked me for some feedback on her own posts.  Over time I grew to really love the  quirky, funny video posts she featured. One day I had a brainstorm — one of these videos would be a great way to explain my business to potential customers!   Michelle agreed to do it, but on one condition – instead of pay, she needed a new high-definition camera to take her video blogging to a new level.  I was glad to oblige and provide her with a tool that could further her career.  

I’m sure you’ll agree that Michelle’s video is awesome, and in a week or so I will be featuring it on my website.

Throughout the year, Michelle and I continued to learn from each other. She talked me into getting on to Skype and has looked to me as a mentor on career issues.  Best of all, Michelle is my friend, and that never would have happened without the social web.

So here’s the lesson of Twitter: You just never know!

Let’s check in again with my formula for creating business benefits on the social web and see how it relates to this case study:

Connections + Meaningful content + Authentic helpfulness = Business benefits

How this worked in the real world:

• Michelle and I both actively created connections by engaging with people on Twitter.
• Because of the meaningful content on my blog, Michelle became an interested follower.  Michelle’s video content created engagement with me and eventually resulted in a mutually-beneficial business benefit.
• We continuously offer authentic helpfulness to each other without regard of any future “pay-back.”  This trusting friendship will continue to pay personal and business dividends.

This formula works.  What “unexpected” Twitter stories do you have?

This is the second installment of the unexpected benefits of the social web. You might enjoy these other articles:

Part 1: How to become a CMO in 10 tweets or less

Part 3: LinkedIn: A goldmine of business benefits

This is a blog post for anybody who has trouble finding the time to blog. In other words, everybody.  I humbly submit a few practical ideas to help you become a time-efficient blogger.  

1)  Leap.I mentioned this in a recent post, but it bears repeating. The number one challenge most bloggers face isn’t time, it’s CONFIDENCE. Can we agree that you will take the leap? You will?  Good, I knew it!  You may proceed to item 2.

2)  Don’t be Chris.  Kids practicing basketball pretend they’re Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant. They won’t be, but they can still have fun playing basketball.  When I first started blogging, I tried to be Chris Brogan, who writes at least one post every day. I nearly killed myself. The bionic blogger and has set the bar unbelievably high.  You can’t be Chris, but you can be YOU quite successfully.  That’s good enough.

3) Take a little bite. Take the pressure off yourself by setting a goal of writing just one 400-word essay a week.  Doesn’t that sound MUCH easier?  Bonus points: Long posts lose readers any way.

4) Set sacred blog time. How long will it take you to write that one short essay? Probably an hour?  Give yourself the gift of one quiet, undisturbed, productive hour each week to write.

5) Write lots of headlines.  It takes time to come up with ideas so write them down right when they come to you. Inspirations for blog topics are everywhere. When I see an interesting tweet or news article that could be a post subject, I go into WordPress and quickly write the headline for the essay. That way, when it comes time for my quiet hour, I have a whole list of  essay topics to choose from.   

6) Stop second-guessing.  Go back to your essay a day or so before you intend to publish it.  Proof it. Tighten it up.  And after 15 minutes, stop!  You can waste far too much time re-writing and second-guessing yourself.

7) You don’t have to be profound.  Here’s a recent post from my friend Danny Brown.  He saw something interesting — a video demo of the electronic magazine of the future. He simply pasted the YouTube link into his blog, wrote a brief comment, and voila — c’est le post.   This was a fun, interesting article.   He did good work. How long did it take him to write it?  Probably 10 minutes. 

8) Listen to yourself.  A lot of people tell me that my blog posts reflect questions and concerns they have but have never articulated. Why not?  When you have a thought, idea or rant — write it out at that very moment when it is fresh and you are full of passion. This is the most efficient way to write and it almost always results in a great post.

9) Leave the technical stuff to a technical person. Don’t spend your precious time trying to figure out why your blog widgets are haywire.  Pay an expert to figure it out, even if you like that technical stuff … especially if you like that stuff!

10) Try a video blog. I haven’t worked this area myself yet, but if you’re naturally eloquent, it might be a lot quicker for you than writing out a post. Best practice: Jason Falls.

11) Turn your comment into a post.  You probably contribute comments to other blogs. Why not re-use the time it took to write that comment? Copy your comment and use it as the seed for an original post.  Look at the comment section today. How many of these ideas could become a stand-alone article? 

12) If you run out of ideas, see number 6. Repeat as needed. Seriously though, Google “ideas for blogs.” There are lots of lists of thought-joggers out there.  If you are having trouble blogging, write about it.  Seems like that would be the best cure.

I hope that gives you a practical framework to have some blogging success, even when time is tight. What other time-saving tricks can you recommend?

Other posts that might help:

Ten ideas for the beginning blogger

Can you out-source authenticity? (Great comment section!)

Successful business blogging in just one step

Blogging is the ultimate team sport

How to be a ghost blogger

Zappos* is a successful company with a well-publicized, aggressive employee use of social media.  In fact, it may be the most famous social media model in all of blogdom. They have 13 blogs, 50,000 videos and their employees tweet like rabbits in heat.  It’s worked for them and it’s a wonderful case study. I get it.  But it’s probably the wrong model for most companies.   

And here’s the point where the waves of Zappo-sniffing social media purists come crashing down on me.  So be it.  This is dangerous stuff. 

It is relatively safe to blog and tweet about shoes.  But in many companies, the risk of an all-employee social media free love policy will far outweigh the benefits.  For many important companies all it will take is one Twitter-induced SEC violation, a leak of vital competitive information, or a national defense breach, and the hammer will come down on the use of social media forever. Policies are usually made to deal with the lowest common denominator.

Is this a leadership issue? Not necessarily. There are irresponsible people everywhere.  There are disgruntled employees even in the best-managed companies.   Where corruption can occur it will occur. Welcome to the human race.

So what’s the answer?

Under the following conditions, the Zappos model might be ideal:

• Company culture supports employee engagement
• Company leadership understands the model
• Customer base is active on the social web in a meaningful way
• Benefits outweigh risk of security breach

If just one of these conditions are not met, the free love policy cannot work. 

That’s not to say that social media won’t work in some form with almost any company if there is appropriate training, role clarity, effective policy and boundaries. But you have to fit the tactics to the strategy — and the culture — just like any initiative. 

A marketing leader has to make effective decisions based on what IS, not on what you WISH for. You can’t “will” a social media effort to work in your company just because it worked in the Zappos corporate culture.

For an excellent and thorough perspective on the need for effective and appropriate corporate social media policies, I recommend Kent Huffman’s recent post on the subject.

OK, your turn. Let ‘er rip!

*If you are unfamiliar with the Zappos social media model, Jeff Bullas has written wonderful case studies on this company:

• How Does Social Media Help Deliver On Zappos’s 10 Core Company Values

• Why Would Your Company Need 13 Blogs?

• Revelations On How An Online Retailer Went From Zero to $1.2 Billion

• 6 Ways Zappos Uses Twitter To Increase Sales

One of my pet peeves is this whole “snarky” thing. 

I often see people excuse away their unprofessional on-line behavior by saying “Well, I was just being snarky.”

Since when is it acceptable to be rude, sarcastic and dismissive to other well-meaning, professional people?   We probably wouldn’t act that way in a face-to-face interaction but somehow in the bizarro world of the social web, it’s OK as long as you call it snarky.  Inexplicably, it’s usually the more experienced bloggers who hide behind this position, and seem to be proud of it.  They wallow in their snark. 

Gratefully, {grow} has usually been a snark-free zone.  The folks in this community take accountability for their thoughts and words and don’t hide behind euphemisms.  Thank you. 

As for those who mask cynicism and cruelty behind snark, grow up.  Be accountable.  Be a leader.  Set an example.

Whew. That felt good. : )

Addendum: The day after I wrote this post, I saw this quote from American entertainer Conan O’Brien, commenting on his emotional exit from the Tonight Show: ”I hate cynicism.  It’s my least favorite quality and it doesn’t lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen.”

If you look around the web, there is so much advice about blogging it’s not funny. Still, I’ve learned a few lessons that might help if you’re a beginner blogger and I thought I would give you the inside scoop.   

1) The biggest obstacle to blogging is … not what you think. It’s not writing skill or time or ideas. It’s confidence. People are generally shy about sharing their voice.  If you can tell your kids a story, give nurturing advice to a friend or tell a joke, you can blog.  Just Do It.

2) It takes time to find your voice.  Be patient. The more you write, the more comfortable you will feel. Feedback from the blogosphere will trickle in and help massage your style, tone and topics.  Stay with it and you will improve.  Have faith.

3) “I don’t have time” is not an acceptable excuse any more.   The only people who complain that blogging takes too much time never made it a priority.  Chances are you and your business will benefit from blogging or you wouldn’t be reading this post, right?  If you need to blog for your business, it has to be part of your job now, so approach it that way.  Shoot for one decent post a week. That’s doable, right?

4) In the long run, blogging can SAVE you time!  My posts have become a personal reference library.  I’ll bet not one day passes by when I don’t send somebody a link to an old post as a response to a question or to help them in some way.  This has been an unexpected benefit of blogging.

5) Be brief.  Respect your readers. Respect their time. Spend the extra time it takes to write with brevity.  Cut words ruthlessly. Best practice: Seth Godin.

6) Don’t write an academic thesis.  It’s much more interesting to read blogs that are written in a conversational tone.  Talk with your friends.

7) Write about what interests you.  Your audience will find you.

8) Read more than you write. Much more.  If you’re not an active reader of blogs, get on the stick. To be a successful writer, you have to be a great listener and learner.

9) If you want people to support your blog, support them, too.   I just think it is an act of respect to support blogs written by your readers by commenting, tweeting and highlighting their great work.   If you’re part of my community and you have a blog I will do whatever I can to help you. We’re all in this together. 

10) If you run out of ideas, go to a LinkedIn forum for your industry.  Find an interesting question.  Answer it.  That’s your blog post. Works every time. If you’re really stuck, go to Guy Kawaski’s blog.  Put it on your record turntable. Play it backwards.  That’s where the secret messages are hidden.

Let’s hear your comments, now.  What advice would you pass on?  Who is setting the standard out there for best blogging practices, and why?

Pop quiz: Over the next three years, what is the number one skill that will be needed by marketing professionals?

Answer:  An ability to entertain.

I realize that is not normally something you would put on a resume.  Let me explain.

I often wonder, “Who really has the time to read all these blogs?”  Don’t you feel a bit overwhelmed by the amount of information coming at you every day?  Of course. Who doesn’t? 

Well, guess what … you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!   2010 will The Year of Content as the fight for your attention gets much, much more competitive.  

Who do you think will win that fight?  The organizations with the most riveting content. 

What will make that content riveting? It will entertain, it will amaze, it will amuse.

And who is going to make the big money on the social web?  Those who can make that entertainment happen.

Yes folks, the ability to entertain will be a white-hot commodity.

Of course creativity and an entertainment factor has always been in demand in advertising circles but I think we are looking at a future where you are going to have to employ Madison-Avenue-quality entertainment value just to get eyeballs to your company blog.  Let alone understanding of the message.  Let alone engagement.  Let alone something that turns into a sales lead.  Consumer expectations to be entertained, as well as informed, are rising exponentially. How will you deliver?

I’m not saying there isn’t going to be room for serious commentary and discussion.  Of course there will. But let’s put it this way, if you have a choice to read a blog that’s interesting or a blog that is interesting AND consistently entertaining, where will you spend those precious moments of your time? Case closed.

What are you going to do to cut through this rising tsnamai of content with YOUR message?  Do you really think a company blog or Facebook page is going to cut it?

As for me, I’m dusting off my dancing shoes.  It’s Hammer Time.  Can’t touch this.

Community alert: Jon Buscall, a frequent contributor to {grow} has written an excellent post on this same topic.  Jon writes well but he cannot dance worth a shit.