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Session summary: Members of the BlogHer Business Advisory Committee will each present one top-notch business blog and blogger. Get a crash course on what they went through, and why they succeed.

(Apologies in advance for misspelling, missed names and other tragedies of being in a rush. Everything is a serious approximation of what was said.)

Introduction: Welcome from Tony Bloomberg. Marianne Richmond makes introductions.

# Small Business Blog: Susan Getgood interviews Shirley Frazier of GiftBasket Business Blog.

Susan Getgood: Tell us a little bit about your blogs.

Shirley: (summarizing)
First blog: Giftbasketbusiness.com. Only two business blogs for this industry. Shirley does not have this kind of business (which represents a 4.8 million dollar industry); she services these owners with her blogs. She speaks around the country; helps people find their niche.
Second blog: Solo business marketing, for independent professionals who need marketing help, education and support. This blog is 2 years old.
Third blog: Laughingchow.com Photography tips for people with a recreational interest in taking pictures.

She publishes on Wordpress platform. Took a lot of effort to learn WP; not always easy, but worth it.

Why blogs as a marketing tool?

Blogs complement her writing career, to establish a platform and fan base. This helps people find marketing support for themselves, by themselves. Blogs drive traffic to her website. Had Giftbasket site first; blog was complementary. She gets few comments but lots of traffic. She’s hopeful the conversation is beneficial.

How do you measure results?

1. Sale of my educational materials.
2. Statistics from the site.
3. Passive revenue that she gains through advertising. Giftbasket business blog drives most advertising revenue. It’s not that the GB owners don’t know how to use the web, they don’t know about blogs. Their novice status helps drive click-through rate. Mutually beneficial.
4. More speaking engagements.

What advice would you give to small business owners?

Be very proactive at having and maintaining your blog. Difficult for me to understand how the whole blogging thing worked, but learned by reading other blogs. Your blog is kind of like running your own newspaper. You have your own voice. YOu can elicit other opinions from other people. Great way to grow your business if you stick with it.

# Media/publishing Blog: Elana Centor interviews WashingtonPost.Newsweek Interactive CEO and Publisher Caroline Little.

Elana: Talk a little bit about what you are doing right now. We talked earlier about newspapers coming around on this point.

CL: We’ve been doing this a long time. We got into this because print revenue comes from classifieds; but we needed to repurpose things in the paper and that included being involved online. The Post has never had a national presence until the internet. 90% come outside of our area and never receive a paper. It’s very different than a local paper. We’ve made some mistakes–but that’s important because it’s a sign you are doing something new and that’s good.

Elana: When you decided to become blog-friendly and had to weigh the risks, what were the risks?

CL: Not too many risks. Journalists were excited to have a wider readership. We were willing to open things up and allow a wide response of opinions. Issues of pay, but by and large people are happy.

Elana: Would you mind talking about the mistakes you’ve made?

CL: We had one situation from a non-Washington Post bloggers had plagiarism problems. When we posted comments on posts, things got very divided and irate in the comment section–especially before the election. They were threatening comments so we shut them down. We took a lot of criticism for that.

Elana: What’s the buzz behind the scenes from other newspapers about what you’re doing?

We’ve taken the position that the web is open, like a party. Our role is helping someone navigating what they want to see. The readers can choose. We’re offereing enough of a roadmap that people come back. Other sites think you should never link to a competitor. We disagree. We trust people understand the contextual/linked nature of the web. We understand readers will come back. We have a different philosophical approach–ours is very open.

Elana: How do you evaluate if this experiment is working?

CL: I evaluate it based on we won a national Emmy last year. Lots of awards. Our audience is growing. Our revenues are growing. So far it’s really working, despite the challenges.

E: How do journalists feel about this?
Some people want the website to be a reflection of the newspaper. Other people love it so much–it’s the coolest thing that it expands beyond that.

I don’t think the paper is ever going to go away. But we have to think about multiple platforms now. The audience story is so different that we have to think about how to find meaningful ways to reach people. I think we have a shot at reaching them. Very touch coming from traditional media.

Alana: What’s your biggest surprise from when you started this?

CL: There’s a lot. In some ways the more successful you get the harder it is. I’ve been surprised by our online media success. I’ve been surprised by the intimacy that comes from blogging, it’s a very different way of reporting. Video that really works on the web is very intimate. Just talking.

# Solopreneur Blog: Lena West interviews Carmen VanKerckhove from New Demographic

Tell us what you do.

New Demographic is an anti-racism training company. Two blogs. Anti-racistparent, racealicious and a podcast addicted to race.

Why have a free-for all about race, when you had so many other choices. (laughter)

(wireless down)

Started without strategy, but now you have two blogs, a podcast, etc. How do you get it all done?

I love doing what I do. I don’t see them as marketing tool–it is a part of the company. I have the part of it that’s grassroots because anyone can go online and participate. Also does pre-timed blogging and then the posts trickle down for less time-sensitive issues. Using delicious, i use daily blogpost, anything you bookmark are published to your blog the next morning. For me, that’s how I cover the subjects without taking too much time.

What are your results? What are you getting back?

I’ve gotten a lot. Number one thing is media coverage, New Demographic has been featured on CNN, NPR–lots of media coverage. This has established my reputation as an expert in this area. That’s huge. Also, speaking engagements–every single client has come to me through the podcast. They’re long-time listeners. All the time I was building connection without realizing it. Also, more interest from daytime talk shows and a book agent contacted me–this is all….. I don’t have tons of traffic from my blogs, so my point is you can accomplish a lot without tons of traffic.

What’s the one thing someone had told you someone had told you before you started this?

Can’t think of anything. My tips–1) don’t forget about email newsletter. There’s still a lot of value in a lot of people on those lists. Put on your homepage–some kind of free offer content along with email sign up. 2) Make it obvious who you are and how someone can contact you. Make it clear on your site–spell it out. It really helps cut down the confusion.

# Large Enterprise Blog: Maria Niles interviews Staci Schiller from the Wells Fargo Blogs team.

(wireless issues–arrrrgghhhhh!)

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 22nd, 2007 at 2:51 pm and is filed under Journal, blogher, blogher business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.