Let the Blog Bashing Begin

Pete Blackshaw predicted this would happen and he was right. A blog bashing movement is underway. In a new report, eMarketer is questioning whether businesses will ever blog. They're following the effervescent Nick Denton. He got the ball rolling with his "Up with People-like" quotes in Sunday's New York Times.

In all fairness, eMarketer does feel blogs are important. In fact, like I have been saying, they believe that many consumers are visiting blogs without even realizing it because they look so professional. That said, they try to throw some serious water on the blog hype. Here's a sampling of quotes ...

• "Blog creation has, if anything, outstripped the growth of readership"
• "New figures released by Pew earlier this month, however, showed readership growth had stalled."
• "For all the interest and activity in the blogosphere, however, American businesses appear to be taking a cautious approach. A spot check of the companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 found just four percent of companies had any form of publicly available blog -- and not all of these were current and active."
• "Decentralized by design, blogs are unlikely to become a mainstream business communications tool without change at the root level of corporate culture."
• "Doubtless more companies will give blogging a shot. But for the time being it is difficult to see corporate blogging becoming widespread, however tempting the new format may be as a marketing and communications tool."

Geez, what a downer. All we're missing is a sappy Tiny Tim song. OK, so all eMarketer really did here is regurgitate a lot of existing numbers that are already out there and confirm that there is a lot of fear in Corporate America.  Wow, what insight! Don't bother spending $695 for the report. Lots of people can tell you this for free.

What eMarketer totally neglected to talk about, however, is what the opportunity is for the companies that do decide to be brave and take the plunge. For example...

• Significant competitive advantage -you could become the loudest voice in a channel where your competitors are absent
• Press and consumers read blogs - either willingly (RSS/bookmarks) or unwillingly (Google); like it or not they influence purchases
  
• Blogging aint going away. The conversation is going to go on without you. Be there or be square
• Blogs are a cost-effective marketing tool that helps smaller and mid-sized companies generate more attention. Just look at Stonyfield Farms.
  

Take this report with a grain of salt. With every major revolution, there are believers and there are doubters. Read everything you can get your hands on and form your own conclusion based on what your company is comfortable with. Just be sure to consider the pros and the cons.