Most corporate blogs would likely agree with the assessment that they are unimaginative failures. They all start with the best of intentions – they need a blog because everyone else has one; it’s the new new ‘thing’; and then they justify it as a means of communicating with and engaging their customers. Unfortunately, this is where they fail.

It’s tough to make a corporate blog cool and fun given that it’s not exactly the most interesting material to work with. A B2C company blog, for instance, stands a better chance than a B2B blog because of the personal nature of the products they sell versus B2B companies that sell more professional products. As the Wall Street Journal wrote, the research conducted by Forrester found that B2B blogs are “dull, drab, and don’t stimulate discussion”, 70% were focused on business or technical topics, 74% rarely get comments, and 56% reprinted press releases or other public news. As a result, it’s not surprising that 53% of these companies find that blogging has little or no impact on their overall marketing strategies. Forrester recommends that companies post regularly and consistently, and add some personality, humor, and unique insight or perspective. All sensible advice. Interestingly, they also found that the number of B2B companies that started blogging in 2007 dropped sharply from 36 in 2006 to just 3 in 2008. Wow! Still a few more months left in the year.

Sun’s CEO Jonathan Schwartz’s Blog is considered the antithesis of unimaginative B2B blogs. He is a strong figure head and personality and has even announced major company events like acquisitions firstly on his blog.

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