The internal communicator’s
guide to blogging
How to set up and maintain a successful corporate blog

Melcrum’s Multimedia CD-ROM series - featuring Debbie Weil and Neville Hobson

How are internal communicators using corporate blogs to maintain an open conversation with employees and stakeholders? Where do blogs fit into your communication strategy? And how can you get started?

New technologies have always driven improvements in our ability to communicate. Blogs are no different. So are you prepared for this new communication channel in your business? When you get that call from your boss – will you be ready to answer his questions?

Order your copy of Melcrum's interactive CD-ROM The internal communicator’s guide to blogging and you'll get the answers to these and other questions.

With expert contributions and interviews with influential bloggers such as Debbie Weil, author of ‘The Corporate Blogging Book’ (Penguin Portfolio, Aug. 2006), Neville Hobson, blogger and podcaster, David Berger, Strategic Communication Manager at IBM, Christopher Hannegan, senior VP at Edelman and Pete Blackshaw at Intelliseek.

Order today and learn:

• Whether or not your organization is ready for blogging
• Where your blog fits in with your communication mix
• How to set up, manage and write an effective blog
• How to deal with the legal issues posed by blogging
• How other social media such as RSS, podcasting and wikis relate
• What policies and strategies companies should have in place for employee-authored blogs

Included on this interactive CD-ROM you'll find :

• Blogs and their Implications on Internal Communication
  Webinar with David Berger, manager employee strategy and communications, IBM and Neville Hobson, blogger and podcaster
  
• The Secrets of Effective Corporate Blogging
  Webinar with Debbie Weil, author of ‘The Corporate Blogging Book’ (Penguin Portfolio, Aug. 2006)
  
• Talking from the Inside Out: Employee Blogs
  Webinar with Pete Blackshaw, Intelliseek and Christopher Hannegan, Edelman
  
• 7 top tips to write an effective blog: white paper
  Debbie Weil, author of ‘The Corporate Blogging Book’ (Penguin Portfolio, Aug. 2006) gives her top tips on writing a blog, which include choosing the topic, organizing your content, grammar and syntax, and letting your “voice” emerge
• The beginner’s guide to business blogging
  This 38-page white paper by Debbie Weil tells you all you need to know about starting your blog. From why you should blog to the technology involved, read expert advice on each aspect of corporate blogging
• Five fast ways to: prepare your company blog for a corporate crisis
  Steve Rubel lists ways in which you can project a human face or voice for your organization during a crisis
• Should the boss be blogging?
  The blogosphere may still be in its infancy, but already some basic rules have been established. Kim Hanson shares a few
• Why GM's leadership blog is a hit
  Read how a weblog created for GM's vice chairman and COO is providing a useful shortcut for connecting senior leaders with employees around the world
• Using a blog to communicate during Hurricane Katrina at State Farm
  Learn how State Farm managed to keep its agents and employees connected to the rest of the world during one of the worst natural disasters of recent times
  

The presentations featured in this CD-ROM are playbacks of 3 popular Melcrum webinars:

The Secrets of Effective Corporate Blogging

You will learn:

• How to write an effective blog
• Who's blogging in the Fortune 1000 and why
• Who should write your blog
• How to deal with the legal issues posed by blogging
• How to determine if your organization is ready for blogging
• How other social media such as RSS, podcasting and wikis relate to blogging

About the presenter:

Debbie Weil, the founder and president of WordBiz.com, Inc., shows large
companies how to brand themselves as customer-friendly and media-savvy using
the Web, blogs, podcasts, RSS and other social media. Her clients include
Edward Jones, HP and Wells Fargo. She is also the author of The Corporate Blogging Book: Absolutely Everything You Need to Know to Get It Right (Penguin Portfolio, Aug. 2006).

Talking from the Inside Out: Employee Blogs

What you'll learn:

• How employee blogs can fit into the traditional concepts of corporate communication,
  PR and marketing
• The kinds of policies and strategies companies should have in place for employee-authored blogs
• How to address the concerns of managers who may be nervous about legal issues and the lack of control
• What makes a good employee blog
• How today's companies join the bandwagon intelligently and strategically

About the presenters:

Pete Blackshaw is chief marketing and client satisfaction officer of Intelliseek, a Cincinnati company whose technology enables marketing intelligence by tracking, measuring and analyzing word-of-mouth behavior, so-called "consumer-generated media." Blackshaw is a 2004 co-founder of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA).

Christopher Hannegan is a senior vice president at Edelman in Chicago and director of its Employee Engagement Practice. He has extensive corporate and agency experience in engaging and communicating with diverse employee groups, including senior leadership, sales forces, front-line supervisors and customer-contact employees.

Blogs and their Implications on Internal Communication

What you'll learn:

• Understand what you want to achieve with blogs
• How to address the concerns of managers who may be nervous about legal
  issues and the lack of control
• Understand what a blog is in communication terms and how they are different from other interactive media you may be using
• Learn and set the rules for blogging: you'll be the person who is asked to
  draft the blogging policy – would you know what to write?
  
• How to get blogs right from the start and avoid embarrassing and humiliating mistakes
  
• Understand the legal ramifications of launching a Blog and how to establish guidelines so that executives and employees understand what material is off limits!
  

About the presenters:

David Berger manages strategy communications for IBM, where he helped create the company's blogging point-of-view and employee blogging guidelines. In addition to his work on blogs, wikis and syndication for IBM, Berger is responsible for communicating IBM's corporate strategy to their 320,000 employees.

Neville Hobson is one of the leading European early adopters and influencers in new-media communication for business. He blogs daily at NevOn (www.nevon.net) with commentary and opinion on business communication and technology, and co-presents For Immediate Release: The Hobson & Holtz Report (www.forimmediaterelease.biz), a twice-weekly business podcast at the intersection of online communication, business and technology.

As well as the presentations and MP3 audios, the CD-ROM also includes 6 articles, white papers and case studies on blogging for internal comms:

By Debbie Weil, a leading authority on blogging:

• 7 top tips to write an effective blog
  Debbie gives her top tips on writing a blog, which include choosing the topic, organizing your content, grammar and syntax, and letting your “voice” emerge.
• Beginners guide to business blogging
  This 38-page white paper tells you all you need to know about starting your blog. From why you should blog to the technology involved, read expert advice on each aspect of corporate blogging.

Specially selected articles from Strategic Communication Management and The Business Communicator:

• Five fast ways to: prepare your company blog for a corporate crisis
• Should the boss be blogging?
• Why GM's leadership blog is a hit
• Using a blog to communicate during Hurricane Katrina at State Farm