Corporate blogging - what is it good for?

I received this email this morning:

Hi John

Johnson King PR has produced a white paper on the reality of blogging as a corporate communications tool.

Written by Guy Clapperton, a highly experienced journalist who has been writing about the internet since 1989, covering its rise and evolution for the Guardian, Times, Financial Times and a host of others, the white paper can be downloaded from www.johnsonking.com or requested via email by contacting me at mikek@johnsonking.co.uk.

The white paper coincides with the launch of Johnson King's own blogging service, enabling us to work with clients to develop innovative, fresh content for their own corporate blogs. If you are interested in discussing our blogging service or any other aspects of PR support in Europe please do not hesitate to contact me.

All the best

Mike

Mike King
Johnson King PR

I did write him asking for the white paper, and I'll read it and let you know what I think about that. But, let's talk about a few things regarding corporate blogging.

First of all, content is the point of a blog. It needs to be interesting, well-written, and novel (even if novel means that you're one of the few to point out an interesting article or blog post).

It needs to have a point of view--of an individual, not of a department or of a company. It has to be willing to offend or anger. Blandness is a surefire approach to irrelevancy. Corporations hate to anger or offend people.

It also needs not to be a sales pitch. A blog that's a sales pitch is as useful to readers as spam. No one will come back. If there's any commercial value to a blog at all, it is to engage the audience, perhaps to the point where some say, "I'd like to learn more about who writes this and what else they do."

Can a corporate blog do these things? There's not a long track record of successful ones. Here's Johnson King PR's blog. Does it meet the criteria?

marketing, blogs