Blogs a strategic marketing tool & keys for corporate success : DM News

DN News, the online newspaper of record for direct marketers, reports blogs are a strategic marketing tool for senior management. “Blogs can provide instant feedback and typically honest information, like taking the pulse of your customers.”

DM also offers three keys to a successful blog marketing campaign.

1. Agree to a strategic role for the corporate blog: Develop a business plan for the blog that spells out objectives and responsibilities and insist on CEO signoff.
2. Develop an internal and external marketing plan: Developing a marketing strategy for how the company will tell the world about its blog is an equally critical business decision. Issues such as where it will appear on the corporate Web site and e-mail signatures? What type of information interests visitors, what information is the company comfortable sharing with internal and external visitors?
3. Track and measure what executive management values: Blog-specific measurements such as traffic levels are basic essentials. To track ROI, companies must also track incoming links as a quantifiable data of the blog’s effectiveness.

Shocking to see this concession in a direct marketing publication: “…[M]any argue that blog sites due to their speed and breadth of communication could replace many forms of traditional advertising, PR and marketing executions.”