Welcome to the Melcrum Social Media Newsletter.

In the forthcoming report on CEO communication, produced by Melcrum in partnership with communications consultancy The Company Agency, CEOs were asked for their views on social media. The vast majority expressed ambivalence or even dismissed it.

“While CEOs understand there may be some applications of social media platforms, this is only in very particular cases where they can achieve well-defined objectives (for example, creating directories to help employees locate each other better globally), says Melcrum’s managing editor for research, Graeme Ginsberg.

“Otherwise, they see social media as quite in conflict with face-to-face communication, which they view as fundamental to effectively delivering their core business messages,” he adds.

So, even if your CEO's reluctant to blog, will they approve senior executive blogging, or companywide blogging programs? This extract from our social media report describes a high-profile blogging success instigated by a senior executive.

The Sun is rising
Jonathan Schwartz is Sun Microsystems' high-profile CEO blogger, but he first began blogging when he was its chief operating officer.

Schwartz’s blog has been used as an example of a senior executive blogging countless times before, but only recently has Sun posted its first profit in five years – a net profit of US$67 million.

How much of that profit can be attributed to Schwartz’s blog and the company’s overall blogging program? According to Simon Phipps, Sun's chief open source officer, blogging “has been fundamental to the organization’s turnaround.” He adds: “We were very lucky to have a very smart chief operating officer who saw the value in blogging immediately, and agreed to change the corporate policy on public discourse to enable all employees to blog openly. Subsequently, around 4,000 of our 35,000 employees now blog (most of them publicly).”

Perhaps it’s time to realize that while not every CEO should blog, the focus of corporate blogging should be on employees. After all, if social media is all about community, then isn’t it of paramount importance that the community can be social?

Best regards,

Alex Manchester
Editor
alex.manchester@melcrum.com

This week's Melcrum headlines:

When it comes to social media, trust is everything
- The Melcrum Blog - 6 July 2007

Is your BlackBerry saving your company money?
- The Hub - 4 July 2007

ROI of ads on intranet sites
- The Communicators' Network - 29 June 2007