Internal blogging is discussed more and more. It doesn’t surprise me. If we compare to web communication in general an intranet is for many companies more effective in terms of ROI than an external site.
Blogs will, I believe, be another example of this – and that should worry blog consultants.
It could be a coincidence, but also a sign of the times when Intranet Journal writes To Blog or Not to Blog: “…the biggest reason to blog internally is to capitalize on the opportunity to encourage communications and knowledge flow upwards in the organization.
Existing communication channels within companies tend to come from on high, be nicely polished, highly wordsmithed by many including the lawyers, and distributed to the masses. With a blog, the power of communication is given to individuals at much lower ranks within the organization.”
If we really do witness a growing interest in internal blogging – and a growing use – I interpret it as a maturing blog market. I hope the consultants trying to find blog work can face the challenge.
It’s one thing to for example build a personal brand with blogging for an individual. It’s an entirely different thing to try to change corporate culture, working methods and so on with blogging as one of many tools.
Where a good writer and decent businessman can build a blog consultancy to do the first, it takes strategic organizational and communicative competence to do the other.
Among the many hopeful blog consultants of today I’m sure there are those who’s got what it takes. But in general I don’t think that blog expertise is enough for internal blogs consulting. And that points in the direction of large agencies as the blog consulting market’s winners.
For the record: I don’t work at a large agency…
Fredrik Wacka is the author and founder of the popular CorporateBlogging.Info blog which is a guide to business and corporate blogging.
Visit Fredrik Wacka’s blog: CorporateBlogging.Info.
