Corporate Blogging and Virtual Communities

Corporate blogging and virtual
communities
Received (in revised form): 5th April, 2013

Bradley Jobling
is Social Media Manager for the Columbia University Department of Surgery. Mr Jobling has 20 years of
web strategy and online marketing experience, and has been a speaker at a number of conferences on
social media. Mr Jobling earned an MBA from the Columbia Business School in the management of
information, communication and media. He is an active member in the Social Media Club of New York
and the Columbia Business School Alumni Club of New York.

Columbia University Medical Center, Department of Surgery, Office of External Affairs, 21 Audubon Ave, Room 209, New York,
NY 10032, USA
Tel: +1 201 723 8605; E-mail: bjobling95@gsb.columbia.edu

Abstract A well-defined blogging strategy that includes purpose, mission and goals
should be the cornerstone of any social media programme or digital marketing initiative.
Understanding and locating blogging communities and the influencers in them is
important to promote readership and participation. This paper describes five strategy
exercises required for a successful blogging programme.
KEYWORDS: blogs, blogging, social media, digital marketing, marketing strategy

INTRODUCTION
As buzzwords go, ‘social media’ has been
one of the most social. Social media have
been endlessly discussed in journals, news
stories and books. Facebook has been
heralded as the ‘deathblow’ to websites. As
the number of smartphones and tablets
grows, mobile and location-based
marketing will change the internet. Yet,
with all these changes and predictions, the
cornerstone of any web or internet
strategy should be the humble blog.
A blog is a tool, like a brochure, a sign,
or even an advertisement. There are many
ways to use it. A blog does not have to be
WordPress, Drupal, or a platform like
Blogger or Tumblr. A blog can be any web
page or a section of a website with
frequently made posts. Blogs usually
include permalinks, tags, archives, and
most importantly, comments.

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Journal of Digital & Social Media Marketing

Blogging software is not a requirement
per se, but as a platform, the specially
defined software optimises results. A
one-click feature or enhanced summary
may seem trivial at first, but in some cases
can mean a 20 per cent growth in traffic
and faster rates of growth.
Launching with the web scene in the
1990s,1 the number of blogs has exploded
to 184 million as of 2010.2 Written by a
class of individuals more educated than the
general public, 75 per cent of US bloggers
have a college degree, 40 per cent of those
are at the graduate level. One in four
bloggers has an annual household income
of over $100,000.2 These are all desirable
demographics.
Blogs vary in topic, size and audience.
Homebound mothers (and fathers) who
feel disconnected from the world use blogs
to socialise. Barack Obama perfected the

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᭧ Henry Stewart Publications 2050-0076 (2013)

Jobling

art of political blogging, breaking online
fundraising efforts at the time.3 Yet blogs
are than a shingle for posting notes or
raising money. Blogs can be used to
organise protests.
A Canadian woman by the name of
Shannon Smith used her blog to organise
a ‘nurse-in’, protesting against a store
manager that requested she discontinue
breast-feeding in a children’s clothing
store. The event received national attention
on Canadian television networks.4 Blogs
can also be used to collect information.
The US Department of Health and
Human Services is the largest health
organisation to have used a blog, having
created it for the purpose of collecting
pandemic flu preparedness information
from healthcare leaders.5
The blogosphere is highly fractured, very
decentralised, and grouped into clusters.
Each community has its own style, norms,
practices and objectives. These clusters
rarely link to each other. To use a blog for
marketing purposes effectively it is critical
to be seen as a peer.4
Business blogs represent one of the top
content marketing tactics used to reach
consumers and potential clients. According
to a 2012 Content Marketing Institute
report, 69 per cent of North American
business-to-consumer content marketers6
used blogs to reach audiences while the
number was 77 per cent for business-tobusiness.6 In the UK, 78 per cent of all
businesses that create content for marketing
purposes were found to keep a blog.7
As depicted in Figure 1, there are five
steps to developing a strategy for a blog.
They are:
1. Listening and research.
2. Defining purpose, mission and goals.
3. Installing the editorial calendar, defining
roles, regulations and procedures.
4. Reaching out through social media
platforms and other bloggers.
5. Analysing, refining and regrouping.


The ‘listening and research’ and ‘defining
purpose, mission and goals’ phases can be
worked on concurrently. They are iterative
processes at times contributing one into
the other.
If the blog is already in place, these
strategic exercises can be performed to fix
or readjust the focus of the blog.
Additionally, these exercises should be
revisited from time to time to
accommodate changes.
Listening and research
Listening, or monitoring, is a social media
term that involves finding and analysing
comments about a company or brand on
social media. In the past, listening was
performed by media-clipping services that
scanned periodical databases for articles.
With the proliferation of blogs, new tools
were created to collect and analyse the
comments. Listening can be performed by
setting up a series of Google Alerts or by
subscribing to a social media monitoring
tool.
Even though listening is the most
important of all phases it is often skipped
or poorly performed. In a 2012 survey
conducted by the consulting firms Web
Liquid and RSW/US, 75 per cent of the
marketing executives surveyed reported
monitoring social media for discussions
about their brand or product; however,
only 25 per cent of these were extremely
satisfied with the results.8 Part of this may
be due to the quality of tools or an
inability to extract actionable insights from
the information provided. When
performing social media monitoring or
listening, the report concluded that paid
tools led to better results.
Why is listening for a blog strategy so
important? A blog needs to connect with
its audience and cluster. Finding the target
community and becoming a part of it
increases traffic and encourages valuable
engagement. By listening to or reading the
posts of others, the blogging team will

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Corporate blogging and virtual communities

Figure 1:

Steps to developing a blog strategy

understand the norms and practices of the
community, ensuring the blog’s acceptance
as a valued member.
Questions to be answered from the
listening (or monitoring) phase of a
blogging strategy include:
• Does the demographic community exist
online? If so, where are they located
and what types of content do they read
and write?
• Can the blog community be classified
into a type? (Examples would include
parent blog, product reviews, political,

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health or travel blogs.)
• What are the norms and practices of
the blogging community?
• What is the purpose of the blog within
this community?
• Do the readers and writers of these
blogs wish to remain anonymous?
• Does the community use specific social
media sites or forums? If so, which ones?
• Is the community currently discussing
the product or service being marketed?
If so, what are they saying?
• Who are the influencers in this
community?

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Even though the types of blogs and
communities vary, those that cater to
specific niche products or services may be
hard to find. If a target community is not
found, there is a distinct advantage to
being the first, but it is not easy work nor
is there instant payoff. Nevertheless, even a
business-to-business industry, such as
cement mixing, can write about customer
success stories to create virtual interactions
that might ultimately turn into real-world
business.8
Outreach to other bloggers at this stage
should focus on finding those who are the
most able to help spread your message.
Unlike traditional media, blogs and
blogging communities do not have
directories or standard rating services.
Looking up site rankings and Twitter
rating scores will locate the more popular
blogs and influential bloggers.
Defining purpose, mission and goals
Once there is an understanding of the
places where target communities exist,
the knowledge gained from this research
can be used to define the mission and
goals.
Effective blogging should be an
extension of existing marketing and
business strategies. Even though online
marketing has been heralded as the leveller
of advertising, a fully integrated approach
that combines traditional and digital will
achieve the best results. Blogging can
achieve much more than just marketing
goals. For example, personal computer
companies were the first to use blogs for
customer service and technical support.
Blogs can also be used to:

• solicit feedback from an exclusive list of
loyal customers to develop and launch a
new product;
• communicate regulatory changes
affecting an industry to clients,
employees and stockholders;
• provide a personal side of the company


by spotlighting the environmental and
philanthropic efforts of individual
employees;
• provide timely and useful case studies to
how clients can use products or services
in unique ways;
• build and foster links with the
traditional media or other bloggers; and
• expanding television and print
advertising to online communities.
Although it may seem like the ‘the sky is
the limit’, it is important to remember
that a blog must be sought out and works
best if informative and participatory. A
spot developed for television can be
splashed on the web, but if not useful or
entertaining, will not be seen by
many.
As for another misconception, blogging
and social media sites are not free. While
blogging software and services can be
purchased and maintained for hundreds of
dollars a year, a blog’s most valuable
resource, the content, will involve time
and resources to be effective.
As social media and blogging audiences
grow, so will the expectations of clients
and customers. Videos embedded in blogs
and used in social media sites should
reflect the image of the company. This is
especially important for blogs targeted to
business-to-business vendors.
To justify the expenses incurred to
develop good content, it is important to
have a clear mission with measureable
goals. Example missions and goals could
be as follows:
• A blog from Columbia University
Medical Center will communicate the
changes affecting patients due to the
enactment of the Affordable Care Act
2010. The goal is to reduce the number
of customer service calls regarding
insurance by 20 per cent.
• The mission for this personal blog is to
connect with others in the social media

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•

•

•

•

field by summarising conferences and
networking events. The goal is to
expand professional networks.
The mission of the Leonia Community
blog is to document and record changes
occurring in the neighbourhood caused
by the construction of the light-rail line.
The goal is to encourage community
involvement and possible political action.
The mission of this internal blog is to
document the steps taken as a company
to resolve a product recall. The goal is
to work with related vendors to design
a solution.
The purpose for this internal blog is to
communicate the changes occurring in
the company caused by the
implementation of a new procurement
system. The goal is to minimise
disruption and provide a platform for
employees to pinpoint installation issues
early.
This blog will communicate innovative
uses of the product line from real
customer experiences with a goal of
increasing sales leads and volumes.

Some goals are not always measureable in
quantifiable terms. Yet whenever possible,
these should be stated in ways to
determine objective success. The mission
and goals can be posted in the blog
sub-header as a constant reminder of
purpose.
Most goals will be business-related and
usually involve sales or leads. As with all
digital marketing initiatives, the results can
be measured partially through a web
analytics package. Analytics consist of
secondary metrics such as page views,
visits, time spent on site, or number of
downloads. Key performance indicators
(KPIs) define goals that affect the bottom
line. The secondary metrics are used to
help tell the story behind changes in the
KPIs. The process and use of web analytics
and KPIs should be considered within this
stage.

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Installing the editorial calendar and
defining roles, regulations and
procedures

Marketing on a blog requires thinking like
a journalist. Growth will require creativity
and consistency.
The first step in achieving this is setting
up an editorial calendar. Good content
takes time to develop and will come from
various sources. Customer service
employees and sales personnel have
front-line access to the wants and needs of
consumers and will be excellent resources
for blog post ideas. A collaboration site can
be used for the process of collecting these
ideas and organising the resources to
complete them.
Along with this calendar, both the
content development process and the
response interaction will redefine
workflows and require new roles that cross
department boundaries. New processes
will need to be thought out to deal with
questions such as:
• Who will moderate the blog?
• Will the comments be policed
internally or by the community itself?
• What are the regulatory roles regarding
the information discussed?
• Does the legal department need to sign
off on content? If so, when should they
be involved?
• What is the process for handling a
customer complaint?
• Who is going to analyse comments?
Within this stage, a team as well as
processes for several scenarios should be
developed and planned.
Reaching out through social media
platforms and other bloggers
In the multi-platform media world of
today, viewers consume information in
various ways and different places. Social
media networks are challenging search
engines as the primary entry point to the

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Jobling

Figure 2: Using the blog as a central point protects the content while diversifying reliance on a single social
media platform

web. Even with the most useful and
entertaining content, readers will require
reminders or hooks to be brought back
into the fold.
As shown in Figure 2, keeping a blog as
a central hub of marketing content and
then using social networks as a means of
spreading this content will take advantage
of the viral nature of social media sites
without giving away control or ownership
of the content itself. Using the blog as a
central point will also protect the content
while diversifying reliance on a single
social media platform.
Social networks require a certain
amount of time and effort. In the end,
these sites still maintain ownership of the
content and the subscribers or fans. In
return for sharing the company’s content,
the networks send traffic to the blog that
can be verified in the analytics. Not all


social media platforms are worthy. Those
that are increase KPIs and important web
analytics.
Blogger outreach should also be
considered as a means of content
distribution. Pitching a story to a blogger
is similar to pitching a traditional meeting.
Targeting the correct blogger with the
appropriate message requires research and
increases the likelihood the writer will
cover the story. Blanket pitching or ‘say
and spray’ does not work.9
Analysing, refining and regrouping
The blog and its community are living.
Changes occur in the members who
participate, the goals and missions of the
firm, and the general business
environment. The reason for the blog may
cease to exist. Throughout the daily and
monthly process of managing the blog, the

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overall strategy and mission defined in
these exercises should be kept in mind and
reevaluated periodically. Any signs of
decreased participation or readership
should warrant immediate intervention
and possible realignment. As growth slows,
it becomes more difficult to reanimate the
hive of activity that was once in place.10
ADDITIONAL CONSIDERATIONS
Comments and commenting tools
Comments are the lifeblood of the blog.
Comments drive traffic and traffic drives
additional comments. To encourage
participation, calls to action are a critical
part of any blog content. A post that is
written to provoke thought, criticism and
even controversy will do better in search
rankings and traffic than one that is not.
Replying to comments in a timely
manner, and in a way that encourages even
more engagement, will promote
conversation and keep the article alive.
Technological features that enhance
sharing and commenting systems are
worth the efforts and cost. Any
engagement performed by a reader should
be magnified as many times as possible and
as privacy dictates. Tools that post the
users’ comments on social media sites or
micro-blogs will help drive and expand
the community. Encouraging commenting
through gamification can also grow the
blog.
On the human side, the community
must have clear rules of engagement and
codes of conduct. The types of speech and
allowable actions should be explicitly
defined; the consequences of violation
clear and fair. As in any functioning group,
order is required for a smooth-running
blogging community.
Content, navigation and attention
Blog content should be natural and in the
first person. Blogs are meant to be journals

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and opinion pieces discussing the
company, product or service from a
personal point of view. The reader should
be made to feel like an insider.
Forget 15 minutes of fame. A blog post
has seconds to catch a reader’s attention.
The length of a blog article should be
short, around 500 words. Visual graphics or
an attention-grabbing picture are a plus; a
well-crafted title critical. Bullet points or
paragraph headers should be easily
scanned to attract the reader’s attention.
Whatever can be done to draw the reader
in is helpful.
An excellent navigation system is
essential to keeping a reader on the site.
Tagging, categorisation and archiving
schemas that help readers locate additional
articles of interest will keep them on the
site for longer periods of time.
Blog frequency
If there was a blog post for every time the
question ‘How many times should I post?’
was asked, the blogosphere would be
much larger than it is today. Unfortunately,
the answer to this question is the typical
consulting answer of ‘it depends’.
As a rule of thumb, experts suggest
that posting multiple times per day will
result in the fastest growth for a blog. For
steady growth, post once per day. Posting
two or three times a week will lead to
slower development. Anything less than
two or three times a week will stifle
success.11 The caveat to these numbers is
the quality of the content. Fewer posts of
higher quality mean more than actual
quantities.

CASE STUDIES
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia
(MSLO)
The consummate homemaker Martha
Stewart is an accomplished blogger. She
hosts ten blogs, covering topics that range

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from home design, crafts, food, gardening
and pet care to purvey her television
programmes, radio shows, magazines and
growing line of products.
Each blog is written by a topic expert,
Martha Stewart herself, or — apparently
— one of Martha’s French bulldogs. In
addition to recipes, crafts, wedding
planning and home design, Martha pens
posts about her farm, trips abroad, an
outing to the circus, even an emergency
trip to the local hospital for stitches. Along
with a few good recipes, takeaways from
Martha’s blogs include:
• Optimal use of content: MSLO uses clips
from Martha Stewart’s television
programmes as web video. This expands
audiences to include working
homemakers and the increasing
numbers of online video viewers. Her
Pinterest site contains pictures of
perfect-looking dishes with links to
recipes on MarthaStewart.com.
• Reaching out through social media: Martha
Stewart uses Facebook, Google+ and
Twitter to promote the content from her
blogs. Effectively using the cluster, the
Martha’s Circle blog posts link to posts
from other like-minded bloggers to
generate additional content for MSLO.
• Be multi-platform to reach fragmented and
changing audiences: In addition to the
social networks and smartphone apps,
MSLO partners with wedding planning,
event, greeting card and recipe/grocery
shopping sites for additional viewers.
• Be strategic: MSLO has a small presence
on LinkedIn with some job listings, but
nothing else. Not every social network
is appropriate for all blog communities.
Knowing the audience will prevent
wasted efforts on unproductive sites.
Analysis will determine how well a
social media site is performing.
Regrouping will lead to new ones as
the blogging and social media
environment changes.


• Be informative for inbound marketing:
MSLO makes money from advertising
and product licensing. Several US
retailers will claim that the Martha
Stewart brand is a leader or driver of
sales in their store.Yet, rarely will there
be a mention of a Martha Stewart
product in any blog content. Posts that
focus on the perfect recipe, the most
beautiful flower arrangement or the
cutest children’s party sell cookware,
stationery, pet scoopers and Caribbean
honeymoons. It may not make good
sense to stretch a brand to all of these
products, yet the use of informative blog
posts as an image builder is spot on.
Mayo Clinic
Can healthcare be marketed on a blog like
a Martha Stewart product?
Hospitals and clinics mean so many
things to different people. Good things
happen in these places like the birth of a
baby. Yet people also go through bad
experiences such as cancer therapy.
Traditional media covers heart-warming
stories, innovative technologies and
celebrity deaths, but mainstream news is
not interested in the small stories such as
positive clinical trial results. Yet these
topics are of utmost interest to the
community or people who have that
condition or disease.
Several years ago, Mayo Clinic took a
risky gamble by creating a few podcasts
and setting up a blog. Within a short
amount of time, results from these efforts
would lead to situations such as a mother
from California finding a YouTube video
about postural orthostatic tachycardia
syndrome and a cure for her daughter.12
Philadelphia Phillies outfielder Jayson
Werth participated in a Twitter chat on the
split tear of his ulnotriquetral ligament
that led to national coverage of his story in
USA Today and an ongoing USA
Today/Mayo Clinic series.13 A
mobile-phone video of an elderly couple

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playing a duet on the piano in the clinic
lobby began a viral sensation that ended
up on Good Morning America.14 These are
all great images of a place that wants to
inspire hope and provide care.
These anecdotes should not be
surprising, however. Confirming long-held
beliefs that more people are seeking
medical advice online, a 2013 Pew
Internet Study found that within the
previous year, 59 per cent of US adult
internet users looked for health
information on the internet, 35 per cent
of those self-diagnosing a specific medical
condition.15
As healthcare information is niche and
at times technical, a blog is a perfect
platform for conveying information that
would be of interest to few, but very
important to those interested. Blogging
seen as the most intellectual of social
media platforms can be an effective way to
communicate with hard-to-reach
clinicians.
THE FUTURE OF BLOGGING
Adoption of blogging by institutions and
businesses varies by industry and audience.
Technology and software companies were
the first to reach out to their audiences.
Healthcare and financial services are finally
getting on board. Still, there have been
some recent, interesting shifts in the
blogging landscape.
A survey by UMass Dartmouth found
that the percentage of firms on Inc.
magazine’s 500 fast-growing companies
that maintain blogs fell to 37 per cent in
2011 from 50 per cent in 2010.
Additionally, 23 per cent of Fortune 500
companies maintained an active blog in
2011, a number that has flat-lined for the
last several years.16
Underutilised platforms to watch are
those that provide event-based blogging
and social media tools. Webinars, online
call-in radio programmes, chats and

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hangouts could be the most sought-out
web content due to their informative
nature, and format that can easily be
consumed on-the-go and on-demand. As
smart televisions become the norm, it will
be interesting to see how technology
changes affect corporate marketing.
Regardless of changes or new
platforms, a strategy-based approach to
blogging of any kind will protect the
value of content and allow for
realignment of the marketing efforts to
environmental and technological changes
as they occur.

References
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3. In der Smitten, S. (2008) ‘Political potential and
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-pots-story-getting-answers-at-mayo-clinic/
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2013).
16. Yu, R. (2012) ‘More companies quit blogging, go
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