Blogs for Marketing and PR

1. Nollind Whachell said:

Short Answer:

Be careful how you approach this, your visitors can detect bullshit a mile away. If you believe in what you’re writing though, then there shouldn’t be a problem, as that belief will carry through to your readers.

Long Answer:

Actually I had a little discussion with David Weinberger last year about this sort of thing. I was looking for a way for computer gaming fans sites to support themselves (in otherwords, trying to discover a new economic model for the Web) and he told me that my ideas that I was coming up with were very similar to his friend’s ideas, Christopher Locke. Therefore, if you haven’t read Gonzo Marketing, I’d recommend that you check it out, as it touches upon this subject.

Anyways, from my personal experiences with this sort of thing, I would say that there is nothing wrong with doing this sort of thing, as long as you genuinely believe what you are writing about the product is the truth and, more importantly, you can talk in your own voice about it.

For example, say a company approached you about some cool utility software that makes it easier to do something on your blog and they were willing to pay you money to say some words and post a link to their product. Well, I would tell them no problem, I loved to do that but you have to let me speak in my own words and relay the good and bad points about your product. In otherwords, you want to be just you, just like you normally are when you post anything else. You don’t want to have to say something that you wouldn’t normally say or believe in something that you normally wouldn’t believe in.

Why is this important? Because for those who frequently visit your site, they will know you, your likes and dislikes. If you start hyping about some product that normally you’d trash, then your visitors will be wondering what is going on. If they do further research about the product and find out it is trash, then they are going to come back to you and say “What’s up?”. If at any point they figure out you are bullshitting them for money, then you have lost your credibility and trust with them and you are no better off than any other marketer out there. In other words, don’t underestimate people’s bullshit detectors. :)

A lot of this is what has been said in the Cluetrain Manifesto and within Gonzo Marketing. People know when someone is speaking in a marketing voice or a normal human voice. They’ve been bombarded by marketing crap so much that they can detect it a mile away. Why do you think people are visiting weblogs more than ever? It is because they enjoy getting information from someone who is talking in a normal voice without an endless bombardment of marketing crap or banner ads.

Even more so, I think one of the main reasons why people enjoy visiting weblogs is because of the beliefs and values that are communicated by the author of that blog. Yes, talking in a normal voice is important but I truly believe that people connect more so with the author’s values and beliefs than with what they are talking about. For example, say two people both ran their own weblog talking about new technology. Say one sold themselves out, accepting money for any post, whereas the other only accepted money and posted about what they truly believed in. Now which one of those sites would you like to visit?

My obvious choice would be the second. Why? Because of the individuals beliefs and values. I would respect that second person’s viewpoints and opinions because I would be able to trust him in believing that what he is telling me is the truth, that he is being honest with me, and that he truly cares about me. Now if these words seem familiar and right somehow, it is because they are the same types of words that you would hope to see describing the beliefs and values of a good relationship. And that is what is life is all about, relationships. Be it with your family, friends, wife/husband, employer, or company that you deal with. No matter the relationship, we expect certain things within it, especially if it is going to a a healthly and longlasting one.

This, in my opinion, is why people despise marketing and so many companies today. Many companies today are only interested in their own personal interests and care very little about the interests of their customers, other than how much money they have in their bank account. This is changing though, as the Cluetrain Manifesto and Gonzo Marketing books described but we still are far from where we want to be. Until companies genuinely are interested in their customers best interest, they will continue to be distrusted by their customers. As with any relationship, if one person is doing all the taking and the other person is doing all the giving, obviously this type of relationship isn’t going to last very long. The same thing is happening in the business world on a daily level. Until people and companies start emphasizing their true values and beliefs, they won’t be getting other people or customers to be in a committed relationship with them.

Therefore, as I said in my short answer above, as long as you genuinely believe in what you are writing, then I see no problem with this, even if it doesn’t particularly relate to your exact blog subject matter. If I like your beliefs and values, then the trust is there. If you mention something else in your life and it interests me, then I will probably trust your opinion of the product and will actively pursue it myself.

This is why I honestly believe that advertising as we used to know it is going the way of the dodo. Genuine honest communication between people is the new advertising (i.e. word of mouth). Heck, it’s already happening on millions of blogs and forums around the web already. People trust other people’s voices within these communities more so than a company’s voice.

Posted on June 10, 2003 05:04 PM | #

3. Keith said:

Agreed on most points and I did see Anil’s post. The funny thing is the clip-n-seal he talks about is something I’ve done on this site.

But, and it’s a big but, Byron, the fellow who started clip-n-seal, is a friend and old co-worker of mine from the Boeing days. If I hadn’t known him I don’t think I’d have made that post. But who knows - it is a really cool product. Got mine just the other day.

Posted on June 11, 2003 02:36 PM | #