Category: Weblogs

I have been thinking about re-designing this blog for some time. This post from Diana prompted me to rethink this again. Unfortunately, most of my work on this blog happens late at night … at the very end of my day — and by that time I am more interested in musing about ideas than working with Photoshop.

That said, while I was in Shanghai I got a haircut. A VERY short haircut (I think something may have been lost in translation — about 3mm). And it makes me think that it is about time I took the clippers to the design of this site.

Of course I need to consider such a move in terms of persona, look, feel and brand. Is this about the Servant of Chaos, and if so, what does he look like? Is it more about ideas, branding or storytelling? What does that mean for a site design? Do I want more control and input than Typepad currently allows? Hmmmm …

All good questions, of course. But perhaps this is just another form of procrastination. Maybe I should just do it.

Have you ever faced this problem? How did you get around it? Or are you still using the same design you started with?

S.

Always willing to try new things, Russell Davies has finished up as Planner in Residence at Nike, and is concentrating on writing — books, blogs and a bit of freelancing. Piers Fawkes at IF!/PSFK has a great interview with Russell on his time at Nike, what he learned, what he didn’t in his previous 20 years, and some insight into the future challenges of big and small brands alike. It is a great read and provides a series of insights that raise more questions than answers (but I think that is the point).

At one point Russell explains that "… the crucial challenge for brands is working out how to be less controlling and more influential". This, clearly, is not just about the challenges that blogs and other technologies provide to brands — it is to do with the social movement or social networking that is occurring as part of the use of new technologies. Whether brands and brand managers like it or not, these technologies are changing the ways that consumers interact with brands, messages and corporate stories.

These changes will have significant impacts on the way that we all tell our brand and corporate stories. We will need to listen more than we tell, we will need to tell more than we dare and we will need to dare more than we would like. Sound risky?

Sounds like fun!

In the meantime, if you see a "mercenary army of rogue marketing professionals" my guess you will see Russell there leading the troops. Good luck Russell!

S.

One of the interesting parts of running a blog is meeting and communicating with lots of different people from all over the world. But something that does seem to unite bloggers and blog readers is a genuine desire to learn and understand what makes a blog work. As a marketer, this is a very interesting phenomenon, because it means that bloggers are constantly working to engage, understand and respond to an audience.

Even more importantly, the bloggers are also (mostly) willing to share their knowledge, their tips and tricks. Often this takes the form of blog entries, but can also include email correspondence or even phone calls. This "community engagement" is what the web has been trying to become since its inception.

So in the spirit of sharing, and for the benefit of my new readers who may not have seen this post, here are the 5 things that I have learned about blogging.

1. Just because you write something doesn’t mean that it will interest anyone (no matter how much you love it)
2. You have got to share the love in order to get some lovin’ yourself (ie don’t think that others will read your rantings if you don’t read those of others)
3. Keep focused, because your readers are interested in the TOPICS you rant about … not necessarily in all the tangents that you throw up (unless your blog is about tangents)
4. Don’t take it too seriously
5. Don’t just "report", analyse and add perspective
6. Anyone still reading? Yeah I know this is six, but the final one is keep trying to surprise yourself AND your readers.

Also, have learned that it can be a delight to correspond and engage with people around a topic either on my own blog or on someone else’s. Keep having fun!

S.

I may have been living a deluded life. I thought I was a goal-oriented person, but am starting to realise that I believe more strongly in an anti-goal.

I submitted yesterday’s post to Darren Rowse’s ProBlogger site and wound up on this list. So I went and had a read of each of the blogs shown and found that there are many, many, MANY other bloggers out there who are far more serious and far more goal oriented that I! But then it started to sink in … I was having a reaction … I could feel a rant coming on. Where was all this taking me?

Honestly, I was surprised at the number of bloggers who were interested primarily in making money from their blogs. Not that there is anything wrong with that … but I wonder how the loyal audience feels about such a frank admission, especially given the open, democratic nature of the blogging community. Is this sustainable? Are we all so compliant and/or gullible?

As Oscar Wilde said, "We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars". Lets hope that the stars we are following are not just space junk. Hey, at least Diana is sharing the love!

S.

Title courtesy of Spell with Flickr.

I am the first to admit that I held off from blogging for some time … I too felt that it was a fad that would pass, and that I, with my extensive experience in the online world, would be vindicated. Alas, I was wrong, and continue to be proven so. In fact, even a casual glance at this site will show that I have been regularly posting for months now (am I addicted … hmmm … no way, I can stop at anytime!).

As you can see from the Technorati growth charts, the Blogosphere continues its amazing performance (if only my web stats were following this trend!). Dave Sifry, the founder of Technorati, goes into the details in this post, but it is clear that blogs are transforming the way that regular web users are interacting online.  And  with tools like Typepad, WordPress and Blogger all making it easier and easier to write and maintain your blog, anyone with an Internet connection can now become an online publisher.
It used to be easy for marketers to reach their audiences. We could just go to a TV network and buy airtime, or to a publisher and buy a page in a high circulation magazine or newspaper. Now there are thousands of authorities with hundreds or even thousands of readers each … all with an opinion and all with a story to tell. The challenge for us is to have a story that will attract the storytellers or all shapes and sizes. So not only is the blogosphere changing the way that our audiences interact … they are challenging the way that WE think.
S.

This blog began as a personal challenge. I wanted to see whether I could summon the energy and enforce enough discipline upon myself to write every day for 3 years — or 999 days. At first I didn’t mind what I wrote — sometimes poetry, other times commentary and even simple links through to other sites.

But a funny thing happened. The blog began to take a shape of its own accord. And as I wrote, the focus and tone became more definite. It is still a work in progress, but my challenge has shifted from one of simply writing, to an even more personal challenge — to write with an authentic voice.

What do I mean by this? It comes down to stripping back my ideas and thoughts. I am aiming for clarity of expression … but also clarity of emotion. It is easy for one to obscure the other, or for words to get in the way of meaning. It is way, way too easy to lapse into jargon.

Russell Davies talks about blogging as being a personal archive of ideas and that those ideas do not need to be breathtaking or "high interest". And one of the comments to this article points to a Simon Waldman article in The Guardian. I was not able to find it, but I did find a great article by Jem Stone detailing Simon’s visit to the BBC where he discussed the shifting nature of journalism. What he talks about is what this article is actually doing … showing how multiple blog entries come together to create something that is greater in value than a single piece in isolation.

So, while one entry may start as a transient idea … there is the potential for it to combine with other unrestrained ideas in some chaotic way. And this new knowledge may actually help someone understand a situation … or may help germinate new ideas. The message is clear — it is all about content. It is about collaboration. And it is about the comment as much as the article!

S.