Constructive Bridges
[Note: This posting aggregates three separate postings: Constructing Bridges, Continuous Mindshare, and Interactive Engagement.]
Constructing Bridges
Many blogs "preach to the choir." This has quite a lot of value as well in terms of inspiring and rallying converted constituents.
But your intent is evangelism, then your intent is to convert the unconverted...the unwashed masses (i.e. they've never heard of you or your ideas). This is a much more ambitious task.
As I write this, I realize just how big a topic this idea alone is. It's about bridge building, often between two cultures. It's about change management as well.
It's important to understand the status quo and what would motivate change. And it's important to show respect for those that still are skeptical of your message or its underlying intent and talk to them in their language. Typically dialogue is accomplished through respect for values and tapping into universal and common desires and motives rather than bashing the idiocy of the current system. Those that are still invested in the current system aren't going to listen to an attack on something they're heavily invested.
There are certainly areas in technology that result in polarization. But as an evangelist you want to understand the reasons (the objections to your message) behind polarization more than you want to join in the crusade.
For instance, in my "agile software development" and "agile project management" example, it is not simply enough to highlight pro-agile stances around bigger-picture contextual references. Unless your "big picture" also includes looking at the reasons why heavy weight methodologies (often cited as the "opposite" of lightweight methodologies that are encompassed by agile techniques) such as CMM and often, RUP, are popular and have been in use for a long time in the industry. In the areas of agile project management, one couldn't ignore the prevalence of the Project Management Institute (PMI), its traction, its message and its certification process. You have to understand the mindset of the heavyweight methodology proponent. You have to understand its strengths.
Your best best for conversion would start with those potential readers that are using the methodology just because that's all they know of - but they are aware of its limitations in particular cases and situations of software development and open to new solutions. It's important to show respect and understanding (both will strengthen your arguments and reasoning) and resist creating a religious war.
And don't underestimate the power of inertia. Typically a product/service benefit must be 10 times better than the current solution to justify a switch in most customer's minds. An example of the power of the inertia is the fact that most corporations won't budge from using the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser even with its multitude of security concerns - what it has going for it is "ubiquity and inertia." Powerful forces indeed. Typically if you are "selling change" - which is typically WHY evangelism is needed - you cannot ignore this fact.
Continuous Mindshare
What is different is that the blog allows for constant communication. If people read the blog every day, they are spending two to seven minutes with us every day. Mailers get thrown away and email get deleted. RSS allows the posts to be delivered to them and they can opt-out at any time. Blogging by its nature is more personal than other marketing communication. I think that strikes a chord with people. (Todd Satterson's interview on 800-CEO-READ blog via CorporateBlogging.info)
Imagine that the audience you want to reach is spending a few minutes with your blog every day (assuming you are updating that frequently). Now that's continuous mindshare. And that's the beauty of blogs. You don't have to wait and hope that the trade press will pick it up…you have a continuous direct conduit to your audience, many of them whom are connected influencers as well.
But continuous mindshare is not a given because you've thrown together a blog. No "build it and they will subscribe." You have to proactively build and grow an audience that anxiously anticipates your next post.
Enticing and encouraging new visitors to subscribe in the first place is necessary. Make the RSS feed easy to find and, depending on the market and your objectives, offer an email subscription if the RSS feed would be a hurdle.
Getting a visitor to your blog site once is not enough. Good intentions to visit again are simple to forget - if you've gotten them to the blog initially and they're interested, encourage subscription there and then.
To keep that continuous mindshare, it's important to post frequently - I know that for many corporations this may realistically occur only 1-2 times a week (and that's really the minimum). If you want to accelerate your success - post every day - yes, each and every day. Make it a daily habit for your readers to look forward to reading your blog.
Immediacy is also important here. Immediacy means respond to direct feedback, comments, or interesting and compelling 3rd party blog posts within 24-36 hours. Otherwise, you often miss the window of opportunity especially in heated debates - the conversation has ebbed and flowed into another topic (that's the A.D.D. nature of the blogosphere). Did you know Technorati doesn't even bother to report results on any topic older than 7 days? The blogosphere is also affectionately known as the World Live Web or the Living Web.
And don't sing the same old refrain over and over like a broken record. Imagine you had to read this stuff every day. I'm not going to mention names, but some blogs have gotten to be way too predicable. You know exactly what their opinion is and what they're going to say. Some consistency around your objectives is required but keep it at a high level. The posts themselves should strike to be fresh, compelling and even surprising. Try taking a different tack or arriving from a new angle, point to new offbeat links, and just be counterintuitive once in a while to sustain interest and avoid staleness. Evolve your message and keep your audience coming back.
Interactive Engagement
Richard Schreuer of marketing research firm Chadwick Martin Bailey talked about how to measure the impact of advocacy. According to their data, advocates tend to recommend products to an average of 6 other people. They've also found that receiving a recommendation on a product increases purchase intent by an average of 6%. So by combining the number of people who say they will recommend a product with the estimated increased purchase intent, you can estimate the financial impact of advocacy. (via Decent Marketing)
While advocates, or customer evangelists, is one of the goals of corporate evangelism, companies must be prepared for the fact that they don't control a conversation.
The shift from crafted unilateral (outbound) messages from corporate to the public to a more authentic, interactive participatory exchange is certainly new for PR and, even more so, for corporations.
The shift implies listening, not just talking. And a continuous feedback loop.
You don't always initiate the conversation, either. Fast Company magazine's restrictive linking policy came under the ire of Boing Boing - one of the most popular blogs - and quickly spread through the Internet:
FastCompany -- the tech magazine for the new economy -- has a spectacularily clueless policy on linking...
As far as lessons learned, Fast Company replied:
This is an instructive example of some of the challenges and opportunities that can arise as more organizations -- not just individuals -- begin blogging. With increased visibility and transparency comes interactivity and responsibility. And if you ever have a question, want to share an idea, or need to clarify something, don't hesitate to contact me directly.
On corporate blogging, Ross Mayfield muses:
Whether large scale adoption of corporate blogging will occur outside tech because of control has less to do with characteristics of industries than leadership. It happens first in information intensive industries, but can happen anywhere a manager wants to gain competitive advantage and is willing not just to give up some control, but recognize its already lost.
Assuming one can be comfortable with the knowledge that conversations are already occuring and control is often an illusion, how do you leverage engagement with interested parties?
A comment by a a Sun blogger on DivaBlog asserts that what's more typical is that no conversations around your company and its products and services is occuring:
The idea of a conversation is great, but what's difficult is to engage the dialog, to connect the other on the discussion thread.
Engagement occurs not just at the final sales delivery channel - to gain advocates for already finished product - but much earlier - during the conception and design phases of products and services. Iterative (for each new and improved version) and interactive engagement is a feedback loop through the entire lifecycle of the product including the earliest embryonic stages. Customers become stakeholders. When customers have a role beyond that of 'consumer' they will engage. Blogs can assist in connecting to the desires, dreams, and wants of the market and to gather that feedback. The product itself is always the primary message. Effort placed on building a buzz-worthy product simplifies evangelist's role.
Author: Evelyn Rodriguez | Jul 13, 04 | Permalink
| 1 comments
Category: @ Evelyn Rodriguez | Topic 2 Corporate Blogging
Microsoft Internet Explorer as an example of the power of inertia? Oh come one. It was the power of a monopoly and the power of money, lawyers and lobbyists to crush the competition.
There was a bunch of inertia with people who used Netscape too, they had the majority of the market share first. Was IE "10 times better"? No. What it was, was free. It is hard to compete with free, not to mention the illegal bundling, strong arm licensing tactics on computer manufacturers and the overall constant pressure of a multibillion dollar company on a mission to crush its only legitimate competition in an area they didn’t own.
If you are going to use an example based on inertia, at least use one that is real. But let me guess, you want to work as a blog content creator for Microsoft in the future and you don’t want any comments to be seen as rude to a future corporate funder.
Posted by: spocko at July 13, 2004 06:02 PM
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