A Case for Corporate Blogs

One of the first consumer blog usage surveys was reported by WebProNews.com last week.  The research came out of Germany and was conducted by a company called Proximity.  I learned about the survey from the AMA blog promoting its "hot topic" event coming up June 24th in Boston on blogging.  As a reminder both the AMA and WebProNews note that this is a German-based study so there may in fact be cultural differences that would impact the findings.  Nonetheless, as Fredik Wacka, contributing writer for WebProNews points out

"If these results are correct, it's one of the strongest cases for corporate blogs I've seen. What an opportunity to have 57% percent of your readers actually interested in your personal opinion, just to mention one detail."

The survey also revealed that 51% of the blog readers visit product and/or corporate sites as a result of reading blogs.

2,700 Internet users were asked about blogs.  The results:

1. 91% of the blog readers expect a fast and appropriate reaction to questions and comments in enterprise blogs.
2. 90% think it's important to make a clear difference between commercial and non-commercial content.
3. Of the blog readers, 54% form their opinions about products/companies on the basis of blogs.
4. 51% of the blog readers visit product and/or corporate sites as a result of reading blogs.
5. 58% of the blog readers, read them to find news and information they can't find otherwise.
6. 57% of them are interested in the personal opinions of the authors, but only 43% are interested in the discussions.

I started to investigate if a similar survey was available in the US and found that John Cass author of PR Communications is involved in such a survey for Backbone Media.   

"Backbone Media is conducting a survey of people who run business blogs in order to get a better understanding of why companies start them, potential roadblocks in the process and how blogs are impacting key aspects of corporate communications."

The Backbone Media Corporate Blogging Survey is accessible through this link:
http://www.backbonemedia.com/blogsurvey/