Corporate Blog

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2009-11-16T18:05:00.002Z

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DTM Comes to Those Who Wait at Internet World

2008-04-28T17:09:00.011+01:00

A free bag of jelly beans and a chance to see what DTM have up their sleeves.

Sounds like an ideal day out to me!

This year's Internet World exhibition at Earls Court 2 in London promises to be a highlight of the year so far, as more and more companies wise-up to what new media can do for them.

Given the current state of the UK economy, it doesn't take a rocket surgeon or a tree scientist to realise that many companies may have to 'streamline' and 'tighten their belts'.

To make the most of their limited advertising assets, firms formerly dependent upon traditional advertising (like TV, radio, billboards, newspapers and magazines) are realising that SEO, PPC, virals, newsfeeds, and the power of social networks can be tailored to dovetail with their existing publicity campaigns.

As ever, it seems that DTM have some experience in these matters, as illustrated by the 12 o'clock seminar in the Digital Marketing Theatre at Internet World tomorrow.

In Putting Your Pint Across we'll hear the story of how AMV BBDO asked DTM to help make a success of the online aspect of the Tipping Point campaign for Guinness by marrying viral and SEO techniques with traditional advertising.

It almost goes without saying that any marketing for Guinness tends to make people sit up and take notice, and the TV ad featuring a unique domino rally was complimented by an amazing amount of interest and feedback online.

More amazing interest and feedback will undoubtedly be buzzing around DTM at Stand E573, as people seek the secrets behind their success.

I'll be at IW tomorrow, so I'll see you there!

Where's the competition?

2007-11-15T00:07:00.000Z

As you may remember this blog is part of a study that was conducted in association with my thesis on corporate blogs. To be more precise, this blog was set up to evaluate the impact of a corporate weblog on the search engine presence of a company. We have been monitoring certain keywords to see how the weblog's ranking changed. Ah, and by the way, the results are publicly accessible. Just hit the link "Ranking Statistics" on the right (below the diagram).

Anyway, last time I checked on the number of incoming links from search engines and the ranking of DTM, I did a more general search out of curiosity to see where the company stands for various sets of broader keyphrases.
As you may know, the more specific a keyphrase is, the less search engine result pages (SERPs) it will produce. Therefore optimising a page for specific keywords is easier since the number of "competing" pages is lower. Imagine searching for "canon printer bargain" as opposed to "canon printer s520 bargain london" as an example.

Now, what I did was check DTM’s ranking for keyphrases that people would be using when performing a broad search for information or services related to the industry of online marketing, e.g. "marketing news" or "online marketing".
I was impressed to find that DTM was ranking with page one positions in virtually all cases. Also some of the largest competitors were ranking significantly lower, sometimes not even anywhere among the first 100 results.
It’s a little odd that some of the competitors have been paying so little attention to ensuring that they can be found by their customers in the simplest of all ways today: via organic search.

What do you think? Do you consider the ranking of a SEO/SEM company to be an indicator for the quality of service that they offer?

Corporate Social Responsibility

2007-11-04T17:09:00.000Z

Funny, ey? I thought it was. But don't they say there's a grain of truth in every joke? Thinking about this one, I suppose the grain must be "risk".
Why? Well, maintaining a corporate blog is all about corporate responsibility.
First, it's a tool for communicating to the outer world that your company acknowledges the interests of society. There is no law that requires companies to be proactively honest and upfront with anybody. But communicating through a blog demonstrates that the company realises its impact on society and is anxious to improve the (social) relationships to clients, employees, local communities or the general public.
Second, a blog also requires corporate responsibility. Once a corporate blog is published and has reached a certain number of visitors you can't just take it offline if somebody posts faulty information or makes an undesirable impression. A corporate blog will become the company's premium medium for online communication and will have a significant impact on the overall perceiption of the business by the general public. And that needs to be present in the mind of those employees who are thinking about posting to the corporate weblog of their employer.
Otherwise, the blogger one day might have to face his boss as shown in the cartoon above, only this time the conversation will leave no room for amusement.

That is the risk. And not just a risk for the blogging employee, but also a risk for a company that has decided to implement a corporate blog. After all, blogging inadequate content will reflect on the image of the business and will result in serious damage if the issue is picked up by other blogs or even the press.
Cerrtainly, this is a risk that businesses have to wage against all the advantages that speak in favour of a corporate blog. But there's also some good news: It can be minimised.
The solution to prevent conversations as illustrated in the above cartoon is to implement a corporate blogging policy.
But that's another topic - one that I might take up in another blog post...

[cartoon source: Brad Fitzpatrick]

11 Don'ts for Corporate Blogging

2007-10-22T17:03:00.000+01:00

Hey, remember how I wrote that post on how to get your first Corporate Blog online in just ten steps? Well, being online is one thing, but you will need to organise content. And not just any content. But before I go into details about that, here is something I found on the web today: BetterBusinessBlogging has published eleven ways to sink your corporate blog "titanic style" ;-) Here we go:

Don't focus on any subject area
Make sure the domain name can be misread
Over-optimise your posts
Always sign your posts with "lots of love"
Avoid pictures
Don't update your blog
Cater to a multilingual audience
Don’t respond to comments
Calculate your blog's ROI
Use lots and lots of external advertising
Avoid expressing an opinion

Want to know more about Mark White's no-gos? Visit his site!

Blogging for PR

2007-10-21T21:10:00.000+01:00

Being from Germany myself, I am naturally also keeping a close eye on the developments of corporate blogging in Germany. A couple of days ago, the car manufacturer Daimler published its first corporate blog. In case Daimler doesn't ring any bells with you: they produce the car brand "Mercedes". Until recently known as Daimler-Chrysler, the partnership with Chrysler was terminated just recently.
Subtitling "Insight into a corporation", the employee blog aims at increasing the transparency of the company for the general public. So far a couple of employees have already presented themselves and their work on the new online platform.

Actually, the new Daimler weblog is a pretty good illustration of another benefit of corporate blogs: Public Relations.
Now, maybe you're going to say: How? There's no PR department or agency involved here, right?
Correct! But I say, does there have to be?
Since PR has been around for a long time, I consulted my Encyclopedia Britannica edition from 1961 for a concise definition. There it says on page 744B: "PUBLIC RELATIONS, the activities connected with interpreting and improving the relationships of an organization or an individual with the public." It does point out that persons in charge of these activities are usually referred to as public relations or pr consultants. USUALLY. And there is no mention of a PR department or agency.
I believe the rather common association to be a clichee that has evolved out of the subconscious perception of corporate spin being attached to any information that is published by a company.
Indeed, there is research to prove that most people feel businesses neither offer enough transparency nor are they being absolutely honest when communicating with the public.

In a way, corporate blogging can fix that. What's a better way to (re)gain the trust from the public than to have your employees talk about themselves and their work, thereby offering company information from behind the scenes? It also gives the customers a voice, since direct feedback is encouraged through the built-in commenting function.
Therefore, businesses cannot only increase their transparency but close the gap even further by engaging in personal conversations with their readers. What sticks is the impression of an honest and open company that takes its customers and other interested parties seriously.
And knowing how PR works for a company, that is ultimately going to reflect on its brand and how well it is going to sell.

Related links:
Daimler's Corporate Blog
ZDNET blog on how "Honesty, transparency can offset customer service disasters"
Article on transparency in Social Media
News on Daimler divorcing Chrysler

Interview with the new CEO

2007-10-18T13:27:00.000+01:00

I can tell you, the past few days have been busy. Not only am I reaching the end of my diploma project, I also had to get upto speed on the newest developments here at DTM. Yes, I am talking about Nigel Bridges, the new CEO who was announced a week ago. And being eager to bring you more information from the inside I managed to organise an interview with Nigel for Friday evening last week. Here's the outcome:

Tobias: Hello Nigel! I am glad you could spare a few minutes for a short interview. Everybody seems very busy... Anyway, before we go into questions I have been itching to ask about Direct Traffic Media for quite a while, could you - as a kind of introduction - just tell us a litte about what you did before joining DTM?

Nigel: Yes, we are busy at the moment. Business is strong and there are a lot of exciting things going on.

Tobias: And about yourself?

Nigel: I graduated at the City University Business School in London. I then worked for an international boutique IT/Management consultancy where I gained experience in consultancy, business development and management - both in the UK and in Hong Kong where I ran the local operations. I then moved to a global systems integrator where I was again involved in both the client-side and in business management, running and growing a number of their businesses in the UK and Europe. Prior to coming to Direct Traffic Media I was with the Brains Group, a provider of offshore software development and other IT services. Working there as a CEO I helped them develop from start-up into a more substantial business that was later merged with Concise to become what is known today as Endava.

Tobias: Ok, that'll do for references. When you were announced to be the new CEO for DTM on the 8th of this month, you said that you were looking forward to, I quote, "working with the existing team who have worked very hard to establish the current leading position, and build upon it in the future." Can you give a brief overview on the history of Direct Traffic Media?

Nigel: Sure. Direct Traffic Media was founded three years ago in London when a gap in the market was discovered that allowed us to give our customers real results and visibility on Search Engines. We developed the system for two years and slowly grew a loyal customer base while we developed and fine tuned the software. We successfully proved the system and went forward from there...

Tobias: ...and how many people were involved back then?

Nigel: At that time just two founders, but not for very long. In the following year or so ten more joined the team, and as we are rapidly growing new people are joining us on a regular basis.

Tobias: Really? What sort of people are you looking to hire?

Nigel: Well, for instance in the UK we are looking to fill positions in Sales, Customer Services and IT Development. Internationally we are also looking to recruit as we move into new geographies as we have just hired our first country manager to look after our business in Benelux and the Nordics.

Tobias: I say, sounds like some serious ambitions here. Maybe I should get my CV brushed up. What are Direct Media's plans for the future then?

Nigel: Well, in many ways it’s quite simple. We intend to grow by being the best at what we do and by delivering on our promises to our customers. Our software solution behind our market leading product is not only excellent but world-beating. Thus, our plans for the future include international expansion plan, which I mentioned earlier, as well as growth in our home market in the UK. We plan on expanding in Europe and we are also looking further afield – we have the opportunity to become a global player if we grasp it properly. The way that we tend to operate is by setting up a core team at a new locations consisting of sales, client delivery and a publisher manager, and take it from there as the business grows.

Tobias: Sounds to me like a company that is convinced of its potential. I am sure that is reflected in your financial figures as well. Can you give us the heads up on annual turnover and net profit?

Nigel: Yes, it does reflect through to the numbers. I can’t tell you any specifics but I can say that we are a growing in terms of both revenue and headcount, and we are profitable. I’m afraid that further details need to remain confidential – for obvious reasons!

Tobias: Too bad. What's the secret? In that case, lets hear with what kind of philosophy DTM intends to pursue those ambitious plans?

Nigel: The philosophy of not just the leadership team but the whole company is driven by three core values: 1 - to work with the utmost professionalism at all times, 2 - to treat our stakeholders as well as we would expect to be treated ourselves and 3 - not to work with clients in certain business sectors such as pornography. I believe that if we commit to do our best for our customers and other stakeholders at all times then we will succeed in what we aim to achieve. Our stated mission is to empower businesses to position themselves in front of their target audience on the internet. This is not always easy, so we need to use a range of skills, capabilities, techniques, partners and software engines to help drive the right traffic to the right web sites so that our clients can increase both their brand awareness and their direct traffic. We don’t know of any other organisation positioned as we are in this area of digital media outsourcing.

Tobias: Since I am not a customer: what do your clients value the most about you?

Nigel: They value our ability to deliver on what we say we will deliver. We are proud to say that our customers perceive us as good people to do business with. Something, that may sound a lot more matter of fact than it actually is these days. We don’t get it right all the time, but we do get it right most of the time and when we fall short we will try to go the extra mile to recover.

Tobias: Righty ho - Nigel, once again: Thank you for having taken the time for this interview...

Nigel: Anytime. Thank you.

Tobias: ... and all the best for your future as the new CEO of Direct Traffic Media!

Nigel: Thank you, and very best wishes for your thesis on Corporate Blogs.

***
That's that. Any more questions from you readers? Be sure to post them in the comment section and I'll be happy to not only pass them along but to follow up as well... For more information on Nigels announcement to becoming the new CEO visit our news section.

Business Blogging vs. Corporate Blogging

2007-10-13T23:45:00.000+01:00

While browsing through Google's search engine result pages (SERPs) to provide a to-the-point definition of "Corporate Blogs" for my thesis, I found that most sites seemed to be using Business Blogging and Corporate Blogging synonymously.
On the other hand, I had a really hard time finding a website that actually deals with the question of what business blogging is. Not even Wikipedia, who usually is ahead of everybody else when it comes to defining things, holds an entry. Instead most of the pages to be found when searching for business blogging talk about blogs set up by companies. Even with the definition I found in Mark White's "Glossary of Blogging" @betterbusinessblogging.com you could be led to assume corporate blogging and business blogging were pretty much the same, which is NOT the case.
Inspired by Debbie Weil's rather sketchy thoughts on business blogging in her "Corporate Blogging Book", I decided to phrase my own definition:

Business Blogging is a company's or an individual's activity of involving and utilising the blogosphere for business objectives and commercial success.

The definition implies what Debbie states in her book: Instead of being equal, Corporate Blogging is merely a small portion of Business Blogging. Business Blogging encompasses a lot more: A person living off their blog falls into that area. Marketing agencies that publish ads on public weblogs just the same. So do media companies publishing adsupported blog networks.
Business blogging is everything to do with the question: "How can we make money out of the blogging phenomenon?"

Related Links
Mark White's definition of a business blog
Wikipedia's definition of a corporate blog
This blog's definition of a weblog

Your own Corporate Blog in 10 steps

2007-10-11T23:30:00.000+01:00

Have you ever thought about creating a blog for your company? Believe me, it is easier than you think. Today I am going to demonstrate just how easy, by showing you pretty much exactly how Direct Traffic Media set up the very same corporate blog you are reading right now. And it only takes ten steps to get your first post online under your own domain!
I do assume you have your own domain/website already. If not check this site to find a hoster to suit your needs. For the following step-by-step guide which is based on using Google's blog API for publishing you will need to have your ftp details ready. So, here we go:

Step 1: Browse to blogger.com and hit "Create your blog now"
(Click on the picture to enlarge the screenshots)
Step 2: You will need a google account. Enter an existing email of yours, followed by a password for blogger.com, a name that will appear as author for the posts. Enter the word verification. After reading the terms of service, tick the box to accept and hit "Continue". (In case you already have a google account this page/step will be skipped)
Step 3: Leave all fields blank. Instead, locate and click the hyperlink "Advanced Blog Setup"
Step 4: Fill out the required fields.
- The Blog title is the title that will later appear as the name of your blog.
- I recommend selecting "Listed" to get your blog indexed in the blogger.com directory.
- Ftp server requires the adress of your ftp server, an URL looking something like ftp.****.co.uk.
- Select ftp, or if supported secure ftp (sftp).
- Enter a subdirectory if appropriate. If you plan to set the blog to be on top level you need to enter the path of the web servers main directory (look out for an already existing index.* file)
- Specify a filename for the blog's mainpage, e.g. index.html
- Type the full name under which the blog will become available to your visitors
- Enter username and password for logging on via ftp.
- Enter word verification and hit "Continue"
Step 5: Choose a template and hit "Continue"
Step 6: Hit "Start posting" as soon as the success message appears
Step 7: Type in your first blog post and hit "Publish Post"
Step 8: Wait for publishing to finish and click on "View blog"
Step 9: Admire the first post of your corporate blog online!
Step 10: Get back here and post your feedback! Did you experience any problems? Need any assistance? I am looking forward to reading your comments in the comment section...

Blogging is branding

2007-10-07T23:10:00.000+01:00

"A blog is something you can hack away at in ten minutes a day - and at the end of four months you have something phenomenal". That is what J.D. Iles once said when commenting on the blog he set up for the Lincoln Sign Company, a small sign-painting shop located in New Hampshire in the USA.
Using the typepad hosting service, J.D. regularly presents the latest products along with some trivial chit chat. Ultimately, having this blog as an addition to the already existing website aims at attracting prospective customers who may later be encouraged to place an order.

And that brings us to another use of blogs for your business: global branding. Just to be clear what we are talking about, "branding" is the process of creating a brand, i.e. the visual, emotional, rational, and cultural image associated with a company or a product.
Now, global branding, or by marketing consultant Hugh McLeod referred to as global microbranding is nothing new and basically only implicates two characteristics:

First, that you are a company or an individual involved in branding and
Second, that you are doing so on a global scale

The prefix "micro" in this context simply emphasizes that were talking about a tiny brand potentially selling all over the world. Unless of course you're working for Coca-Cola ;-) But then you wouldn't be looking to build up a brand now, would you?

You will find that global microbranding has already been happening long before the internet was invented.
Whether it's a famous Italian impressionist selling his pictures to fans in Asia, a Swedish pop group publishing records in the States, or a fine Scottish Whisky distillery that has made a name for itself on the continent.

Now having said that, there has been a major development since the introduction of the WWW that is now being amplified further by the concept of blogs: branding has become a whole lot easier!

With blogs at hand, here are just some of the things you DON'T need to spread your message far and wide beyond your immediate client base and local market:

High profile name
Large marketing and PR budget
Goodwill of mainstream media
Profound marketing knowledge

That's what drives J.D. Iles with his sign painting blog, that's what Hugh McLeod (and his partner) found when creating the brand for their microbusiness of selling high price tailor made suits to international business men and I imagine that is also the reason why British entrepreneur Butler Sheetmetal Ltd. is still keeping up the posting on his corporate blog"the tinbasher".

Stay tuned if you'd like to know, exactly how simple it is to set up your first blog and why blogs more than any other website help you reach prospective customers!

Related Links:
Lincoln Sign Company
SignsNeverSleep - The Lincoln Sign Corporate Blog
Tinbasherblog - Butler SheetMetal blogs about business
Hugh McLeod on the issue of Microbranding
Free bloghosting with Typepad
How to use blogs in business (part 1)

How to use blogs in business

2007-10-06T11:33:00.000+01:00

Admittedly it's been a while since my last post on this blog. And I was glad to see that somebody at Direct Traffic Media took the opportunity to fill the gap by reporting straight from the DTM stand at the ad:tech London conference last week. I do hope that those of you who were there took the time to pop round to our stand for a chat!

By the way, did you see we integrated a link to our blog ranking stats into the blog sidebar?
Click on the hyperlink just below the graph to get to the page that we use for monitoring our corporate blog rankings for a list of specified keywords.
You can validate the results by typing the keywords into the corresponding search engine yourself, e.g. "corporate weblog" which should appear on 4th position in Google UK.
Now, try searching for "ad:tech london blog"! A fabulous position 6. Switching to "uk pages" only will even get us up to 3rd place.
Isn't that impressive? I certainly think it is, and that is one of my top reasons why I like to blog.

Which brings us to my next topic: Corporate Blogging benefits.
Expect answers to questions such as the following:

What do I do with a corporate blog?
How can a blog help my business?
What are the reasons for creating a corporate blog?
How do I use a blog in business?

Actually, this topic is so huge that I have decided to split it up into several blogposts over the next days... or possibly weeks.
For today, I bring you:

Blogs as the new company website
There are a lot of people out there criticising Web 2.0 and the hype it currently receives. But even they cannot avoid acknowledging that, with applications such as weblogs, some major developments and improvements have finally come to "live" on the WWW that were long long overdue.
The world wide web has traditionally developed into more and more of a mass medium for communication in our society. Unfortunately, this has led to two major undesirable side effects from the recipients point of view:

one: lack of personality
two: lack of interactivity

Weblogs as a homepage put an effective end to that. They are personal because they are written by real people and in a conversational tone of voice. And they offer the means for interactions through a couple of functions such as post related comments, trackbacks and pingbacks.

Quite a few companies, especially small and medium sized ones, find the advantages to be so overwhelming from both the readers' as well as publishers' point of view, they have begun relaunching their corporate site using a blog engine. That way readers can profit from weblog functionalities such as commenting and RSS-alerts while the company has a very easy way to maintain their business presence online via the blog's integrated content management system (CMS). Also used by publishing and news agencies but on a much larger scale, this downsized and simple CMS enables non-technical employees to instantly update the website without knowledge of programming or professional web layouting.

So to sum it up, a Corporate Blog can save you money because it reduces the amount of expertise and personell required to maintain a professional corporate website. Also, Corporate Blogs are one step towards meeting your customer's rapidly changing needs in a WorldWideWeb where communication has become increasingly one-way and impersonal.

Related Links:
Google Search for "Corporate Weblog"
Google Search for "ad:tech london"
Tim O' Reilly, the first to come up with "web 2.0", explains what it means
Tim O'Reilly comments on blogs as being the drivers of Web 2.0
Short definition of a Content Management System (CMS)
Blogs as business opportunity drivers in the UK

Ad:Tech London Blog

2007-09-29T10:09:00.001+01:00

We have some more pictures and information about our Ad:Tech exhibition. The show was a huge success and we would just like to thank everyone who helped make it a success:

firstly all our clients who came to say hello
all the members of the public who talked to us about what we do (we love talking about it to anyone who will listen!)
everyone who wanted to sign up for our promotion
everyone who helped at our stand - Gary, Ashley, Andy, Nigel, James, Steve, Izak, Laurence, Anita, Zoe, Regina, Rian and Enrico.
and a special thank you to Julian for his efforts (one of our clients who are just as passionate about our results as we are!)

We made many great contacts, spoke to very interested companies and are raring to get in touch with everyone.

We will blog again in the new week with some stats on the leads and some more detailed feedback.

Direct Traffic Media at Ad:Tech London

2007-09-26T12:08:00.000+01:00

Direct Traffic Media will be exhibiting our range of products at Ad:Tech London over the next 2 days. If you are going to be there, please drop in and say hello - we will be more than happy to meet you. We are at stand 618, right next to Theatre 2 and the Digital Consumer Forum. Just look out for the free Jelly Beans which have become our trademark at these shows.

After we had very successful stands at Internet World and the Online Marketing Show we decided to represent ourselves at Ad:Tech again.

We will be showcasing our Online Marketing products, including our Search Marketing, Link Popularity, News Delivery, Corporate Blogging and other Internet Promotion services. We will also be giving away free keyword promotions to show our ability in promoting your keywords on the search engines. This will also give clients a look into our Rank Tracking solution which tracks the keyword positions in Google, MSN (Live) and Yahoo.

We hope to see you there and will blog a bit more about the show here.

Why blog in business?

2007-09-23T06:13:00.000+01:00

One of our readers wrote me an email recently. He asked when I would finally get round to actually saying why businesses should at all bother about setting up a blog and putting any effort into getting employees to write blog posts. Indeed that is a question which has not really been discussed on this blog so far. One explanation being the fact that there are SO MANY reasons for companies to start (corporate) blogging yesterday that I have not even finished researching and compiling them all.
So for the time being, let me evade the answer to that question just a little longer by mentioning two quotes by some very famous people:

For one, Mr Paul Watzlawick, a highly renowned scientist in the area of communication theory once said: You cannot NOT communicate.
This basically means that whatever you do, you send out a message, even if you intend not to. Or more to the point: By refusing to communicate in one way or the other you actually communicate a message which says that you do not WANT to communicate. Clear?

Secondly, Mr Bill Gates, founder and currently chairman of the software giant Microsoft said in 2005: Eventually, most businesses will use blogs to communicate with customers, suppliers and employees, because it's two-way and more satisfying.

Now in a way, these two statements render the original question irrelevant. How important is the WHY if everybody else is going to do it sooner or later? And what kind of message do you send out if you say: "My company does not blog!"?
Giving that as a reason as to why one should be motivated to do something may seem a bit blunt and irrational. In the end, why should it make sense to do what everybody else does, just BECAUSE everybody else does it? Depending on the issue this might even be a dangerous choice, because the majority does not always have to be right. But is there really any risk involved? Can Corporate Blogging be dangerous? Can any harm come to your company by your employees blogging?

If everybody had been so sceptical at the beginning of the 90s when the WorldWideWeb (WWW) was first introduced to the internet, do you think we would find on the web what we can find there today?
When it came to companies deciding whether to present themselves on the www, it was not a question of: WHY should we do that and what's in it for us? It was more like: Are my competitors online, yet? Do I have an excuse for NOT having a homepage of my own?
Regarding companies today, not being online with a web presence is commonly perceived by the public at large as an image deficit.
And do you personally know any companies today that do NOT have their own website?

Rest assured: I will go into detail WHY having a corporate blog is essential and WHAT it can do for your business, but in the meantime let me throw back the question by asking: Why NOT blog?

Related Links:
Timeline of internet history
Waltzlawicks Theory (German) - did you know he was Austrian?
More on Watzlawick at Wikipedia
Bill Gates' statement on blogs

[Picture taken from devos]

Who writes Corporate Blogs

2007-09-17T06:30:00.000+01:00

I was handing out surveys to the busy employees of DirectTrafficMedia the other day. The aim was to gain some more information on the company and the dedicated people working there to please customers and continously improve the business.
Making a blog truly corporate can become quite a challenging task when you're looking to provide insight into the company for the outside world. But whilst I was thinking how I could raise the awareness of how a corporate blog is really driven by the employees of the company, I realized that I have not even begun to introduce myself to our readers. So here we go:

My name is Tobias, and I am a 27-year-old student from Germany. After finishing my apprenticeship in 2006, I continued working in the IT department of a middlesized pharmaceutical company whilst finishing with my evening courses of studying what in english would be called something like "Business IT". Sometime in spring this year I finished my final exams and began looking for a topic to study as a diploma project.
From the beginning, I was keen to find something related to corporate blogging as I was a hobby blogger and quite fascinated by the potential that weblogs have to offer for companies.
My aunt in England was the trigger that led to a first contact with DTM where I brought up my ideas about what I wanted to work on in my thesis.

As a highly motivated company operating in the area of online marketing and search engine optimisation, DTM seemed like a pretty good choice to assist in realizing a study that is looking to answer the question of how effective a corporate blog can be in improving online marketing.
So a couple of mails and phone call later I had a clear topic I could get approved for my thesis. And that's where I am now: blogging away on the DTM Corporate Blog, writing about how effective blogging can be, while evaluating whether this Corporate Blog can prove the theory right.
So is it just going to be me writing here?
Well, YES! At least for the time being. Establishing a Corporate Blog in any company can be quite a lengthy process, for the following reasons:

a) it's something new - and we don't like change
b) it does not (immediately) appear to have a benefit - so why bother?
c) it creates additional workload - and don't we have enough to do, already?

Now, say you were an employee in a big company being bored by the bureaucratic routine of your everyday work. Then, posting on a blog might even come as a welcoming break from the daily routine. Doesn't writing, even more than reading require not just imagination but also creativity?
The situation generally is a lot different in a small company, especially when you are talking about a rapidly growing business such as DirectTrafficMedia. Time is of the essence and needs to be spent thoughtfully and efficiently. And spending it on writing blog posts about your work or your company isn't anywhere in the Top Ten of anybody's ToDo-List. Which is not to say, this will never change.
But for now, you're stuck with me!

What this blog is not about...

2007-09-10T06:30:00.000+01:00

Corporate Blogging is a huge topic. Evaluating its effectiveness for businesses can be approached from several angles. To understand why, it can help to take a closer look at what exactly makes a Weblog a Corporate Blog.

At first glance, it seems corporate blogs are nothing more than blogs published by a company. That is incorrect.

Have you got any idea how many company-authored weblogs you can find on the web?

Even a blog residing on the same subdomain (e.g. http://blog.companydomain.co.uk) does not automatically make it corporate. Take all those company blogs that just rehash or bookmark information on topics that are related to their line of business.

YES, it is true to say that a Corporate Blog is published by a company. But NO, it is not the company behind each and every post, i.e. the marketing department. It is the people in this company who write blogposts.

Blogging is not about painting a big picture, it's about what people have to say. Remember how we explained in our post on the definition of weblogs that it's all about personal communication. Delivering content that is related to the company's daily business and at the same time being personal. Making this oxymoron work in a company blog is what truly defines it as being corporate.

That brings us to a second characteristic. One that may distinguish corporate blogging from private blogging simply because in one of its variations it does not exist for noncorporate blogs: Accessibility! Whilst private blogsites live and thrive on being online, corporateblogs don't even have to be publicly accessible!

Debbie Weil, author of the Book "The Corporate Blogging Book" is utterly convinced that there are a lot more corporate blogs in protected company intranets than public ones. At first, this may seem a little absurd. But the use of being company internal becomes apparent if you look at the goals of these internal weblogs that are shielded from the outside world through a firewall. Admittedly, these goals do bend the originally intended purpose of weblogs rather strongly, but judge for yourself:

Internal Coprorate Blogs can be used as a collaboration tool for

Knowledge and Information Management
Imagine every department had their own blog. And every single colleague could and would contribute information that he or she thinks is relevant. How often have I discovered that a colleague had been previously working on and solved the very same problem I'd decided to try to resolve. Of course, knowing this beforehand would have saved me a great deal of time and effort. Use blogs to document insider information such as solutions to problems or brainstorming ideas. That way blogs can be utilised as an easy-to-use platform for sharing knowhow with everybody else so that future work can be done more efficiently.

News Publication
How many mails do you get per day? And what gets deleted first? Exactly, newsletters! Weblogs can replace Email-Newsletters. Issue news on blogs and people will visit whenever they are interested. They will always see the latest news as well as previous publications. Those who want to keep up-to-date permanently can subscribe to the newsfeed.

Project Management
Depending on the size of a project there can be a lot of processes involved in managing it. Document and coordinate them through a project related weblog. Coordinate appointments and post meeting minutes. Give status updates. That way project team members as well as project requestors can be kept up to speed.
Customer Relationship Management
If Customer Orientation means anything to your company, why not use blogs to publish and share information related to customers, phone calls, client visits.

Whilst internal blogging is an ideal opportunity for large companies to test how the use and concept of weblogs is accepted within their company, it is practically irrelevant for small businesses since its utilisation will most likely only be efficient in business environments that require a great amount of coordination between a large number of people.

That, plus the fact that we as a company in the area of Search Engine Marketing (SEM) have an interest in studying the effectiveness of public Corporate Blogs, is the reason why we will not ellaborate any further on the concept of internal corporate blogs.

Innovate or Imitate?

2007-09-03T06:34:00.000+01:00

Are you a leader or more of a follower? More progressive rather than conservative? Chief or Indian?

Have you ever asked yourself this rather personal question? The answer is also what defines your everyday activities and how you are successful in fulfilling your ambitions.

If you are more of a person who rules, guides or inspires others, then you have a very proactive attitude that sometimes involves taking risks. You develop your own ideas and are not dependant on following the same (secure) paths that others have walked before you.

On the other hand, if you are more of a person who accepts leadership then you will prefer others to show you what needs to be done and maybe also how it's done. In having this more reactive attitude you depend on the ideas of others and are prone to walk paths that have proved themselves to be worthwile following.

The same can be said for companies. Remember how in an earlier article I described the DirectTrafficMedia company as being a Digital Pioneer in its line of business?
Firstly, wanting to become a pioneer requires the characteristics of a leader. When you develope something new, you go where nobody else has been before. You risk failure in the effort to get ahead of the pack, showing others how things are done.
Secondly, being successful in doing so will result in leadership and others following in your footsteps because they in reaction want something of the cake you baked.

Ultimately, when it comes to the concept of corporate blogging, there is a decision to be made: should my business start blogging now or not?!
And who do you turn to when more of those questions arise, such as

What is a corporate blog?
Why should my business blog?
Of what importance is a blog to business?
Can my company use weblogs as a marketing channel?
What are the risks in setting up a corporate blog?
Are there any secrets to effective corporate blogging?
How do I set up a business blog?
... and so on

As I was digging on the net to find out what others were writing on issues such as the above, it turned out there seems to be no such thing as a blog consulting agency that earns money by telling you how useful blogging can be to your business and how you should go about it.

When browsing through the pages of twenty of our direct and indirect competitors, I came across an interesting observation:
Although already just over half of them have something like a business blog in place, 70 percent of those who do don't openly advertise services related to Corporate Blogging. Only 20 percent of all the targeted British companies operating in or around the business of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) or Search Engine Marketing (SEM) just about manage to mention the term "blog" in one or the other context.
So to sum it up in simple words: Nobody seems to think that there is much to be gained by offering consulting and services in the area of corporate weblogs.

For us here at DTM this is an opportunity. One that relies on the answer to the question "What are we going to be: An innovator or an imitator?"
Setting up this corporate blog was not very innovative as we were merely catching up with what some of our competitors were already doing in a more or less corporate manner and fashion.
But taking a closer look at corporate blogging to evaluate its usefulness in business could once again prove our ability to innovate and lead as a digital pioneer. Provided, of course our studies succeed in proving the potential weblogs offer to any kind of business.
That is the risk involved, but we wouldn't be a leader, if we weren't prepared to take this risk now, would we?

PS: Below you will find a table with information gathered on some of the most active SEO and SEM companies in the UK, providing the basis for the statements and figures as mentioned above.

Company Name	Based in	Blog	Blog Service	PR	Alexa (in k)
BigmouthMedia	Edinburgh, Scotland	no	no	7	40
Hobo	Greenock, Scotland	yes	(yes)	7	99
Just searching	Adlington, Manchester	yes	no	6	34
Neutralize	Tolvaddon, Cornwall	(no)	no	6	91
Seoco	Lancaster, Lancashire	yes	no	6	111
Southborne Internet	Bournemouth, Dorset	yes	no	6	240
Fen Digital	near Cambridge, Cambridgeshire	no	no	6	366
Se Optimise	Oxford Road , Oxfordshire	yes	yes	5	92
Green Light Search	London	yes	no	5	211
Refreshed Media	Bournemouth, Dorset	yes	no	5	268
Vertical Leap	Portsmouth, Hampshire	yes	no	5	328
Design Insite	Glasgow, Scotland	yes	no	5	513
Xseo	Stafford, Staffordshire	no	no	5	587
Outsourcing4U	St Anne's-on-Sea, Lancashire	yes	yes?	5	606
Seo Company UK	Oxford, Oxfordshire	no	no	4	903
Internetmarketingscotland	Glasgow, Scotland	no	no	4	912
1st Page Prophets	London	no	yes?	4	2500
Blueclaw	Leeds, Yorkshire	no	no	3	258
North South Media	Kilwinning, Scotland	yes	(yes)	3	297
Beyonder	Isleworth, London	no	no	3	1700

The definition of a Weblog

2007-08-26T16:40:00.000+01:00

Blogging is great. So we say. So do many others say. But when asked WHY, many people struggle to convince others about the advantages of a weblog as opposed to other forms of online content presentation. It turns out, many people don't even know what a weblog is.

Now, as we intend on talking about corporate blogging and what it can do for your business, we need to clarify the definition of a weblog first.

To start with, weblog is an artificial word derived from the two nouns web and log. Then again web is short for the World Wide Web. A log in this context is a record of something, e.g. a performance, a series of events, or simply of day-to-day activities.

Looking into traditional dictionaries you will find a short definition typically being based on the meaning of the nouns in that very same word construct. Therefore, a blog (short for weblog) is a web site containing a personal online journal. In this journal the blog author offers his thoughts and reflections, as well as comments and links to other web resources.

Not really satisfactory, since it still raises the question: What makes a (personal) blog ultimately different from all the other personally authored homepages on the net?
A blog is quite different from conventional websites because it

is interactive: a blog is not just a pure medium of presentation, it is a form of interactive communication. The author might be writing whatever he has to say, e.g. how great his day at work was, how he got stuck in that awful traffic jam again, how much fun he had at the last concert of his favourite rock band or what he thinks about the latest candidates for prime minister. But he is also interested in what his readers think. That's why all weblogs have a commenting function offering the reader a possibility to give his/her feedback on the blogger's post. A really good discussion may arise from this, especially if the author in turn reacts to the readers commenting.

is written in a conversational voice: looking at the structure of a blog there are clear parallels to ordinary news sections on conventional websites: regular updates presented in reverse chronological order. Whereas news are written in a formal and neutral tone, blogging is all about becoming more personal, thus reading somebodys blog is more like talking to him/her in a face-to-face conversation.

is created using instant publishing software: maintaining a simple homepage of your own, usually requires a fair amount of programming knowledge if only about HTML (Hyper text markup language). Not so with weblogs. As miniature forms of a Content Management System (CMS) they do not require tech expertise - write and format as comfortably as with your office desktop software, hit publish and that's pretty much all you need to know to get your word online.

alerts readers automatically about new additions: people coming to a cool website for the first time might be thrilled with its content and say: Hey, great site, I am going to check back in a few days to see whether there is anything new! Traditionally, they would add the site to their browser bookmarks/favourites and revisit a few days or weeks or maybe months later. Or maybe they would even forget about it altogether. Not so with a weblog. Every blog offers a simple and easy to use way of being notified automatically when something new has been added: Feeds. Subscribe to a blog's feed with your browser or a feedreader software and you will never miss out on the updates.

By the way, popular synonyms are RSS or Atom, sometimes also as a prefix to the word feed, e.g. rss-feed.

is updated more frequently: take a common news section on any website and you will find it is usually updated in very generous intervalls. Visit any of the top 200 blogs out there and you will find that on average they are updated about once per day, some even several times per day.

By the way: as a side effect, search engines such as Google have realized that there is a valueable relation between promptly posted weblog articles and the topic they deal with. They are generally considered to be most up-to-date on any issue. As a result, Google rewards blogs with higher rankings in search engine results, a fact we will deal with in a later blog post.

is part of a social network: some people might find it a little hard to understand the concept of online social networking. Indeed it is one of those Web 2.0 terms that is considered by many to be receiving a great deal unwarranted hype. Nonetheless, it is a known fact that most bloggers feel like being part of something. Something they generally refer to as the blogosphere. Adding the factor time to the above characteristics it may become a little more tangible how a blog will establish a substantial amount of constant readers who comment on each other. This form of (online) social network offers a lot more potential for making an impact with what you write about.

For companies the aspect of blogging in a working social network will become quite relevant as it can be used as an effective tool for viral marketing, another issue we will pick up in one of our future blogposts.

So much for a more in-depth look at what weblogs stand for.

Having provided the necessary basics, this post will enable us to proceed with the subject of corporate blogging and what it can do for businesses.

DTM: A Digital Pioneer

2007-08-22T06:34:00.000+01:00

Today's entry is about Direct Traffic Media as a company. I am going to talk about who we are, what we offer and more importantly, why we think we are special.
On our website we advertise ourselves as a Digital Pioneer.
Well, a pioneer is a person or a group usually characterised by its activity in originating or helping to introduce something new. This something, typically, is a line of thought, an activity, a method or a technical development.
We at Direct Traffic Media can claim to be the first in researching and developing a certain method for off-page search engine optimisation.
Before we take a closer look at that method which we developed in 2004 and which goes by the name of one-way direct-link advertising, I would like to explain briefly what is commonly understood by search engine optimisation (SEO) and what we mean when we talk about off-page SEO. For those of you who are already familiar with the definition of SEO: feel free to skip straight to our off-page SEO part.

The name Search Engine Optimisation (or in American English: Search Engine Optimization) by itself might be a little misleading at first. You might be tempted to think SEO is the constant effort of search engine providers to improve the algorithm and general operation of their search engine. But whilst it is true to say that SEO is all about optimising, it is in actual fact not the search engine provider but the web content provider who is the optimising part in SEO. Since a web content provider does not have any influence on the algorithm or operation of a search engine, he adapts the content of his website to best suit the algorithm of the targeted search engine(s).
Now you might be asking yourself: Why should anyone want to invest money, time and effort into optimising his homepage?
Well, the aim behind SEO is quite simply to achieve better ranking in the search engine results for a defined set of search terms. By the way, in SEO these search terms are also referred to as keywords.
So, to sum it up, Search Engine Optimisation is classically defined as a marketing technique of preparing websites to enhance its chances of being ranked in the top results of a search engine. I say classically because there are more ways to influence say the Google algorithm than just by working on the target site's content. That's when we get to speak about off-page SEO.

Now, generally speaking off-page SEO can be understood as any method of achieving a higher ranking in search engine results by OTHER means than modifying or adapting content on the page that is to be optimised (on-page).
When we at DTM come to speak about off-page SEO we specifically refer to our new website promotion method launched in June 2005: Our advanced one-way link-building software.
Being just one of our effective software engines, this one is absolutely unique in the United Kingdom and enables companies to actively take control over their ranking, thus drawing more high value customers to their website(s).
This highly specialised off-page optimisation product has the ability to deliver page one results in Google for high value keywords by making use of a large network of publisher, affiliate and agency websites.
Ever since going productive after extensive testing in 2005 the DTM one-way link building software has established itself as a booming product tailored to the needs of businesses that are looking to position themselves in search enginges more effectively and more efficiently.
While meeting the demands of those clients for transparency and accountability by providing easily accessible rank tracking and reporting functionality, our 95% customer retention ratio speaks for the success of the overall product.

So much for a first introduction to Direct Traffic Media and our core competence.
In case you're interested in free advice on optimising your website be sure to visit our homepage...

Related Links:
Direct Traffic Media Homepage
Merriam Webster's Definition of a 'pioneer'
Defining SEO
Off page SEO factors

DTM Corporate Blog online

2007-08-18T13:03:00.000+01:00

Hello and welcome to this new extension of the DTM homepage: Our Corporate Weblog.
Have a seat, make yourself comfortable, biscuits are right over there and would you care for some coffee?
Yes, that's right. This blog isn't really just about us, it's quite a bit more than that. It's about you.
Now, for starters you might ask yourself: What is a corporate weblog?
Alternatively, should you already know the definition of a blog you might also be one of the curious sort asking: Of what good use could such a thing possibly be to a company such as DirectTrafficMedia and its business?
Well, quite frankly I'd like to pass the question back to you by asking: What are you doing here or what was it that brought you here to begin with?

And that just about rounds it up why we are here and what corporate blogs are there for.
A blog, and that's all I am going to say as far as this first introduction goes, is a communication channel.
A medium meant for YOU - or rather a medium directed at YOU.
Consider it a way for us to say hello and introduce ourselves and what we stand for.
And being a company that specialises in offering products in the area of online marketing with a special focus on link building and search engine optimisation, also be sure to expect a great deal of information on the issue of Corporate Blogging itself.
A phenomenon not only brand new to the DTM web presence but also considerably unexplored to the rest of the World Wide Web, especially in Europe.

Join in on the ride and you will get to know more about us at DirectTrafficMedia as well as our effort in evaluating the effectiveness of our pilot project and case study: Corporate Blogging as a tool for corporate communication and a medium for online marketing.