Note: This story is available on both Industrial Market Trends and the International Association of Online Communicators Blog. We will share comments from both audiences in order to open up the dialogue and share ideas in true blog and wiki fashion.
We have reached the end of the week and my time is up. I wanted to use this last day to share comments from both blogs. A sort of cross-pollination of ideas and questions.
Comments from the IAOC
Re: Blogs ‘n’ Wikis: Business Models or Drinks at a Social Gathering?
by Don Dunnington at 11:37AM (EDT) on Jun 27, 2005
Paul,
Thanks for the opening thoughts. In your experience in dealing on a daily basis with the industrial market, how many managers in this marketplace (engineers or marketing) seem to be familiar with RSS, blogs and wikis? Are they using them in their own companies, or do they plan to use them in the near future?
Have managers gotten to the point where we can go beyond "what is it" and point to real success stories in the industrial arena?
Don Dunnington
President, IAOC
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Re: Re: Blogs ‘n’ Wikis: Business Models or Drinks at a Social Gathering?
by Paul Gerbino at 02:04PM (EDT) on Jun 28, 2005
Don,
Great question. There is still an awareness problem on the existence of these technologies. The message needs to get out that these models are relatively inexpensive to produce and can expand your reach.
We did not even touch on RSS which is another exciting technology we have been using for almost two years.
I believe we are still in the education process of "what it is".
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Comments from Industrial Market Trends readers
I think that blogs and wikis have a tremendous upside in an engineering environment. Given the geographic separation of many teams, blogs and wikis allow the team to collaborate more efficiently. One challenge may be version control as a specification evolves. Overall I think blogs and wikis are in their infancy with regards to an engineering collaboration tool, but there is great potential to changing the work habits of engineers, just like instant message did to the corporate landscape a few years back.
Posted by: Barry at June 28, 2005 07:51 AM
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Blogs and wikis are valuable and will continue to become even more so. Although the term "blog" or "web log" is relatively new, their use has been popular since online services first emerged about 20 years ago. They used to be referred to as threaded bulletin boards or Special Interest Groups (SIGs) and have been an incredible tool in bringing together like-minded people - whether engineers or people with similar hobbies.
Wikis also play a vital role as long as the participating community is large enough and passionate enough to "police" bad entries. This can be illustrated by posting erroneous information to Wikipedia. The errors are usually removed or corrected within minutes.
Enterprising individuals will continue to find unique ways to use blogs and wikis to improve interaction and productivity.
Posted by: Jeff at June 29, 2005 12:19 AM
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The technology behind blogs is still in its infancy. It reminds me of the early days of the World Wide Web, when Mosaic and Netscape were the only browser options. The tools may be a bit crude, but still highly effective, and easy enough to use that millions of individuals are reading/writing blogs every day.
For one measure of the current size of the personal blog world check out LiveJournal - a 'personal publishing' system. This morning they are reporting 2.6 million 'active' blogs with about 20,000 new postings in the past hour. Clearly this technology is easy enough to use today even for personal users.
Posted by: Robert at July 1, 2005 10:56 AM
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Most of the clients I deal with on a day-to-day basis do not understand the importance of providing up-to-date news on their site. They often don't feel that their niche manufacturing plant produces news worthy material. Do you have any suggestions for bringing news out of an industry sector that does not relate to press releases and traditional marketing?
As a designer, I am interested in seeing blogs become a more integrated part of a Web site.
The clients that are interested in blogs or forums often talk of creating a separate site instead of a unified site design. With a well branded and designed web site combined with the power of a blog, companies in all sectors can bring in more visitors and increase their traffic.
-Dan Finney
Posted by: indiana web design at July 1, 2005 04:45 PM
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Dear Dan,
Thanks for the question and comments. Anytime a company solves a problem for a customer, adds new features and services, opens a new facility or merges with or acquires a company they need to issue press releases. Press releases are the documents created from a public relations effort. They are an integral part of the marketing communications mix. All companies should do them when they have something to talk about.
One note of caution, do not create press releases just for the sake of sending something out. Journalists will catch on and it is a good way to become blacklisted. If that happens any real news you have will not be taken seriously.
If any of your clients need help in writing a press release, they can visit our section "How to Write an effective Press Release" at http://news.thomasnet.com/writerelease.html. We have created a primer on press release writing that should help. They can also find a PR agency. On our page "Public Relations Resources", http://news.thomasnet.com/pr_resources.html we list associations of PR professionals.
On the blog and site design, the placement of a blog inside or outside a site is driven by the type of blog. If it is a company blog speaking to a market then you should integrate the blog in the overall site design. Be careful that the blog is not seen as a self-serving advertising bulletin board for your client. It will not develop credibility and will not grow in usership.
Posted by: Paul Gerbino, Publisher, Industrial Newsroom at July 2, 2005 07:35 PM
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Thank You
I want to thank Don Dunnington and the IAOC for the opportunity to write these posts. We hope you enjoyed these entries and we look forward to future discussions of how these technologies can be used by businesses.
Here is a little information about who we are:
About ThomasNet Industrial Newsroom
ThomasNet Industrial Newsroom, a publication of Thomas Industrial Network, Inc., is the largest publisher of new industrial product news on the Internet. We deliver more new industrial product news than many of the newswires combined. Our news is delivered daily and leads in both quantity and quality. Every press release we receive is reviewed by our editors to ensure that it is truly news. Each release that is accepted is turned into a concise, factual, news summary that is easy to read and delivered on a timely basis. We cover the broad industrial marketplace delivering the latest news to the industrial community.
About Industrial Market Trends
Industrial Market Trends, located on ThomasNet Industrial Newsroom, is a comprehensive, daily industrial blog with a bi-weekly newsletter. Industrial Market Trends publishes the latest industrial developments, best practices, market trends and opinions of our editors and readers. We welcome all our readers to post their opinions on any of our articles.
