billington cartmell. the thinking brands agency

About the Author

Neil Davidson

The blogging community has an incredible reach and a disproportionate influence over its audiences. It's estimated that well over 180 million people have started a blog, writing over one million posts a day and with over 350 million readers. It seems obvious that all brands should at least be considering how they tap into the power of blogging communities, but they also need to consider the model they adopt for doing this. 

Blogging's success is partly due to the quality of writing, speed to publication and the clarity of viewpoints, not obscured by media owner interference. (The Huffington Post is a good example, with an estimated audience of over 45 million readers.) The success of blogging is also due to a shift in consumer attitudes, turning away from older, established conventional news sources and brands to 'my media', digital brands that they now have greater trust and belief in. 

Given this shift in media power and consumer attitudes it seems strange to apply old marketing techniques to this new equation, particularly a digital PR approach. The opportunity for brands is to look at their approach to blogging in a new way, not as a short-term tactical tool, an extension to their PR strategy, but as having great potential as a strategic brand tool. Bloggers are not another digital tool to be turned on and off to fit the peak and troughs of marketing campaigns. They can be a brand's strongest brand ambassadors, but brands need to invest time, money and care into building ongoing relationships with key bloggers, essentially relationship marketing for blogging.

Stormhoek is still a great example of the power of using brand blogs to drive success. Other brands can learn a lot from it and the success of its 100 Dinners in 100 Nights approach to engaging with bloggers:

• It understood, engaged with and flattered bloggers, rather than imposed the brand's worldview on them.
• It acted on the insight that bloggers love other bloggers – using Hugh MacLeod as the force behind Stormhoek flattered bloggers, as it told them that they were considered to be in the same class as this top 100 blogger.
• It didn't try to influence their views on your brand or product in the way that old-school PR did.
• It let go control of the brand and let bloggers decide whether it was good enough. 
• It gave them unique content that made them look good in the eyes of their readers, another deviation from the classic PR press release approach.
• They continued to nurture the relationships established with the bloggers.

The opportunity for brand owners is to think differently, engage with bloggers on their terms and then reap the rewards.