FPRA - Florida Public Relations Association Blog

This is FPRA Blog Week, so we should probably have one article about blogs, right? As we said earlier, our focus for this event was always going to be traditional public relations topics to provide more benefit to our members. Perhaps it is fitting then that the last article posted would be about a new—and to some, a non-traditional—tool. However, some may argue that blogs are no longer non-traditional—they are the future and need to be integrated with your current practice of public relations. Perhaps we could say that blogs are the true birth of public relations?

Let's start with some ground rules.

1. Blogs are a Tool

I am not dismissing the social implications of blogging, just setting the framework that they are one of the many tools that a PR practitioner has at their disposal. As we have read in the past few days, other tools are: editorial boards, investor relations, community service, events, etc. Not every organization has a need for all the tools available. As a lone consultant, I thankfully don't have to worry about investor relations. A blog might not be right for your organization. You don't have to blog. Feel better now? But you should pay attention to blogs.

2. Blogs are Conversation

The word conversation will always be associated with blogs. There's a good reason for this as blogs are typically written in a conversational tone. In other words, the same way you would actually talk with other people. Readers are very good at picking up marketing speak and other fluff and they don't like it. Writing things like "leading provider" and "enabling solutions" mean nothing and they know it as well as you do. To some, it's a relief to be able to 'talk' in a normal language.

Conversation also implies a two-way loop, otherwise it's a lecture. Blogs allow readers to respond in real-time. Sometimes they'll agree, sometimes they won't, but ultimately you're making a one-to-one connection. If you're monitoring blogs and can listen in on these conversations, just imagine what you might learn about your customers, your competition, your industry and—most importantly—about yourself.

3. Blogs are People

A blog post should always be written and signed by an individual, not 'staff' or 'team.' I can't talk to anyone named 'staff' or 'team.' Who are they? The overwhelming majority of blogs are personal. They are real people talking about experiences in their lives. According to Technorati (the most popular blog search engine), 75,000 new blogs are created each day. Add to that the 65,000 new MySpace members coming online each day and it begins to add up. People are publishing. You may say it's trivial, not worth the time, and that nobody reads it, but somebody does. And a large number of somebodies do. A blogger might only be writing for a few friends and family and that's all that matters to them. However, more and more these personal blog posts spill into the business world. A blogger might write about an experience at a restaurant. And now that 'review' is suddenly available to the world via a simple search on Google or Yahoo.

4. Blogs are Connected

We all know that a large portion of what we put on the web is indexed by the search engines and can be searched and found by anybody. Bloggers interested in a particular topic will search and link to others interested in that topic. Within many vertical markets - hobbies, sports fans, political groups - there are well established networks of bloggers all talking with each other.

Check out your child's MySpace profile. Chances they have 50/100/200 friends that are all connected. Add in each of those 200 friends' networks and you'll see how one post can be spread to thousands within a few minutes.

5. Blogs are Media

Upon finding out that sites such as YouTube have more visitors than the New York Times, you begin to realize that your media selection might not be the same as your neighbor's or your audience's. Organizations have seen that a single post from a blogger can have far more impact on their company than any newspaper story or radio interview. If your measure of 'media' is their audience (circulation, viewers, etc.), then you might be surprised that some blogs have more online traffic than your local newspaper has readers or television station has viewers.

People sometimes complain about the diversification of the media landscape and the bias that surfaces in some instances. Instead of saying diversification or fracturing, try saying specialization. Blogs and other easy-to-use publication tools allow very niche oriented sites and publications to exist. Finding and interacting with these focused 'media' allows you to more accurately target your message.

Putting it All Together

Look over the previous five points and put all the pieces together. Do some research to determine how blogs might impact your PR strategy. Just because people might not be blogging about your specific company doesn't mean they aren't blogging about issues or trends within your realm. These might be social issues, health-related, etc. Name any topic and you'll find somebody out there blogging about it. The connected nature of blogs allow you to quickly discover who is blogging and how they are all related. More importantly, you'll find out who they are, literally.

You learn that Susan G. is a breast cancer survivor and talks with hundreds of other women each day about the disease. Read her blog and you'll soon learn the names and stories of many more women. Each of these women talk to others and also work offline in their communities.

Do you have something to add to the conversation? Join in, become a part of it. Become a trusted, reliable source for information. They will learn from you and you will learn from them. Susan reads about your upcoming fund raiser, blogs about it, and suddenly you're connected with thousands of people all interested in the topic.

Because of the personal nature of most blogs, you'll need to be careful how you introduce yourself. Just like most people don't appreciate a solicitation call during dinner, many bloggers don't appreciate an unsolicited e-mail pitch. Each situation is unique, but you must build a relationship first, just like you would build a relationship with your local beat writer. If you can't find common ground to connect, then you might not want to try.

Not every blog is Boing Boing or Instapundit (two of the most popular blogs) and won't reach tens of thousands of people every day, but many will connect you with those passionate about the topic. Unlike media relations, investor relations or a number of other tools where you 'relate' to the public through an intermediary, blogs allow direct communication. But be sure to remember that word conversation. As a two way process, you need to be willing to listen as much as you speak.

Blogs represent a new medium for communicators, but ultimately, many of the traditional tools and tactics you have always used apply to blogs (with a heavy dose of personal relationship skills). At their heart, blogs are about open communication and building relationships on a one-to-one or one-to-many scale. Sound familiar?