The only blogs that I follow are blogs by PEOPLE that tell stories as a means of disseminating their point.
They are centered around a theme, naturally, but the engaging part is the story that the person is telling, and rooting it in their personal experience makes them the expert – as though it is research that they have conducted. So, I offer up that blog topics are driven by our personalities.
For example, Dan (our lead developer) might decide that his central theme is “programming for the web” but he would give it a name like “Nerd Power on the Web”. Then each blog post would be a story from his personal experience, or an experience he can relate to and translate as his own, that eventually ties back to the central theme of “programming for the web”.
By this, we give ownership of each central blog theme to an individual – so if it sucks, it’s their reputation that suffers. If it rules, both the individual and the organization gain value. The point is that pride and personal interest will help maintain quality control.
The arching theme of this post is that the point of social marketing is to drive online relationships deeper before driving them wider. This is done on a person-to-person basis – socializing the way you would socialize at a party where you’re the center of attention – but with new tools.
