Seat at the Table

Perhaps there should be more discussion that differentials between blogs/blogosphere the conversational media, and the weblog publishing tool.Much of the public relations and marketing discussion around business blogs centers on using them as a conversational communications tool. If we take a step back and look at blogs as a Weblog publishing tool (easy to use, integrate and link) and editorial style (short, can be informal, regularly updated) we can find many more uses that address business communications needs. Here are two suggestions (both of which also work well with RSS):An information release system – Businesses’ default information release system is a news release. The problem here is that press releases are often an innapropriate format (too long, too formal to do it as often as needed), the information is not necessarily news, and the approval process is to long. A blog based information release section of a Web site would allow a company to put out a page of information, or one sentence – whatever is needed and no more. In addition, because a more informal style is acceptable in a blog format, the approval process can be cut short and updates or clarifications easily posted.

These suggestions are not necessarily about being part of the blogosphere, they are about developing better ways to distribute information (despite the more conversational era of communciations, companies still need good information distribution programs). Any other suggestions?