Bloggingand

E-retailing

Debbie WeilAuthor of The Corporate Blogging Book

Oct. 20, 2008

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1. Retail blogs (and Twitter)

2. Good writing

3. Defining community

4. The importance of walking the talk

Let’s talk about…2

Hey, ask questions!

Does your brand need a blog?

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Fear

Why aren’t more CEOs Why aren’t more CEOs and companies blogging?and companies blogging?

• of being criticized

• of losing control

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“We shop, therefore we blog”

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Example on page 66 in my book

800-CEO-Read blog 6

Another example on page 66 in my book

Zappos.com blogs 7

Zappos on Twitter 8

Zappos CEO on Twitter 9

He has15,081 followers and he’s following 17,573 Twitterers

Why do these e-retail blogs work?

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You want to be #1 in the online conversation about your brand

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What else?

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“It’s the content (and the writing), stupid”

1. Simplicity2. Unexpectedness3. Concreteness4. Credibility5. Emotion6. Story

- from Made to Stick

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Good blogging is good writing and good writing is

storytelling…

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Read Andrew Sullivan’s essay, “Why I Blog” in Nov. 2008 issue of The Atlantic Monthlyhttp://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200811/andrew-sullivan-why-i-blog

To blog successfully, take off your marketing or PR hat and adopt a new mindset…

Deliver value without selling

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Let’s define community

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From Seth Godin’s new book, Tribes**:

“A tribe is a group of people connected to one another, connected to a leader, and connected to an idea.”

** Highly recommended

Blogs are one piece of the social media puzzle

How do you use these tools to create community?

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Get to know the tools. You’ll be ahead of the game.

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- One in 5 U.S. adults has no landline

- 49% of young adults (18 – 29) are cell phone only users

Harris Poll April 4, 2008

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Mobile

Parting Thoughts

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This is a This is a revolutionrevolutionThis is a This is a revolutionrevolution

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Walking the Talk

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How many of you have your own blogs?

How many of you are Twittering?

Selected ResourcesBooksGroundswell (Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff 2008)New Rules of Marketing & PR (David Meerman Scott 2007)The Corporate Blogging Book (Debbie Weil 2006)

Tribes (Seth Godin 2008)

Blog / Social Media Toolswww.blogpulse.com/trend (search/compare your brand)www.technorati.com (blog search engine)http://news.google.com (get email alerts for your name or brand)www.twitter.com (the new micro-blogging)

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Thank you! 27

Please visit me online www.debbieweil.com

Subscribe to my blog atwww.debbieweil.com/blog