The supply chain of a blog

How can a blog have a supply chain? My blog is a product, a product that consists mainly of literature reviews, for which there hopefully is a demand. In my mental model, using the traditional supply-company-customer chain, my demand are my readers seeking information, and my suppliers are the sources I use for making my posts, e.g.  academic journals, books, and other blogs/websites. My distribution channels are search engines, blog directories, and other blogs/websites, albeit the latter is not always my choice, since I must rely on that other blogs are going to link to me or allow my comments.

So, is it possible for a blog to have variable demand (as in number of readers)? Or variable supply? And can supply chain disruptions happen?  If a blog does have a supply chain, how does it work?

Demand side

My 1st tier customers are those readers who have bookmarked my blog or are subscribing to it via RSS or e-mail. My 2nd tier customers are those readers who find my blog via search engines, e.g. Google, blog directories, e.g. my account on BlogCatalog, other blogs, e.g. the Kinaxis blog that has me on their blogroll, or via social media, e.g. my profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or others. Note that the arrow goes in both directions with the latter three; this is because here I need to supply my blog or posts for them to be found. Actually that goes for Google, too, but perhaps to a lesser degree, i.e. SEO-scuplting of my blog.

Supply side

My 1st tier suppliers are blogs and sites that I have have bookmarked or subscribe to. This also includes academic journals. My 2nd tier suppliers are what I find through search engines, by scouring blog directories or by engaging in social media sites. In addition there are also offline sources, e.g. books and newspapers, TV and radio, leading to further offline sources, e.g. references in an article I read. Offline sources can also lead to other online sources as well.

The supply chain risk of a blog

Using Martin Christopher’s model I can separate the risk into supply-side risk (not finding enough to write about) and demand-side risk (not having enough readers). In addition there is the internal operational risk as to where and how I make my product, and where I decide to distribute it. The blog supply chain risk management will be the topic of my next post. Does my blog need a business continuity plan? Perhaps…

Join the discussion

Here are the answers I got when I asked the question “Does a blog have a supply chain? on LinkedIn. Not all agree that a blog has a supply chain. Feel free to add your answer on LinkedIn or add your comment below. In a later post I will summarize and reply to the comments/answers.

Links

• linkedin.com: Does a blog have a supply chain?

Related

• husdal.com: 2009 – traffic and such

GetClicky

I owe my stats analysis to  GetClicky, in my opinion the best stats tool next to Google Analytics.  GetClicky has several payment plans, with the GetClicky Pro plan giving the best value for money at$10/mo or $60/yr. While this is not meant to be a review of GetClicky, I must say that the stats I get from GetClicky are just awesome, to put it in one word, and the user interface is easy to understand and near self-explanatory.  Enough said, here are the details:

5 most read posts in 2009

• The latest trends in logistics and supply chain management is a post that has very little substance, and just refers to the most sought after journal articles, but it appears to be what people are looking for.
• Supply Chain Risk Management in six steps is a 2006 article by George Cantrell and James Kiser and serves well as an introductory chrash course in SCRM.
• Supply chain risk management: literature review and future research is a review and classification of 82 journal articles on SCRM since 2000.
• Ericsson versus Nokia – the now classic case of supply chain disruption is the case that shows how two companies used two very different approaches to handling the same disruption, and how one company went on to the world’s leader in mobile phones, while the other company didn’t.
• How to get a PhD without dissertation is a true story about how one my postings on this blog was wrongly cited in two research publications as being in my PhD, but that’s not why this post is so popular – the explanation follows below.

5 most used search phrases in 2009

• supply chain risk management is no surprise, given my two most read post.
• trb 2009 used to be a mystery to me, because why would a ton of people from India seach for a conference I went to in the US, but as I found out, TRB is also the acronym for the Teachers Recruitment Board of a state in India, and they announce the examination results online, and that is what people are looking for
• phd without dissertation is the reason why my post on my “fake” PhD is so popular, although I’m not sure what people are really looking for, except maybe how to write a PhD that is not a monograph or other “shortcuts” to academic success?
• how to get a phd must be related to the above.
• logistics trends is a bit suprisingly the 5th most searched for, but results in the most read post, although there are many variations of this search, e.g. supply chain trends, trends in SCM and so on.

Where do my visitors come from?

Looking at the map I still have some white spots to cover.

Unsurprisingly, given my blog topic, and also where most Internet users are, the US and Europe, along with Australia is where I find my audience. The presence of India may be because of “TRB”, or is it perhaps outsourcing and globalization contributing to Indian suppliers taking a closer look at supply chain risk? After a closer check 0f my my Indian visitors to find out, yes, it does appear that Indian-based suppliers to global supply chains are very concerned with supply chain risk. A good sign, I must say.

How do my visitors find me?

Building a blog is about building an audience and a following- So how do people get here?

Obviously, searches are my main source of traffic along with direct hits and bookmarks. The latter are my regular readers. I’m also linked too, but not too much, so I need to work on that. Social media is definitely an underexplored source of traffic, but what social media caters to supply chain risk and business continuity? That will be my challenge for 2010.

Goodbye Google Analytics

The above is just a tiny piece of what is possible with GetClicky. As my blog progresses and as my understanding of how to use GetClicky progresses I will  be able to figure out more about honing my blog. I used to think that Google Analytics was the tracking thing to use. But no more. I really love my GetClicky. It also comes with some nifty widgets to put on my blog, which you can see in action on my audience and traffic page.

Link

• getclicky.com: Get your own GetClicky

Related

• husdal.com: 2009 – looking back

Prolific posting

2009 saw no less than 175 posts, compare that to only 84 posts in 2008. It took me a while to get into the blogging spirit and finding the true purpose of my blog, which is establishing husdal.com as the gateway to supply chain risk research and literature.

Finding my niche

2009 also saw the narrowing of the focus of this blog, from a broad anything that interests me perspective to an academically relevant review of literature and research on supply chain risk and business continuity.

From website to blog

I have had my husdal.com website since 1998, back then with only sporadic “posting” (if you can call it that) every couple of months. It started out as a home page where I would publish my research papers and essays, starting with my MSc in GIS in 1999, and my older research in GIS is still accessible and while no longer among the most visited content, it still attracts a considerable number of visitors. 2007 marked the conversion of my website to a blog for easier content management, having gone through the pains of handcoding HTML, to FrontPage, and on to DreamWeaver. Unable to decide between which blogging platform to use, I started up with typepad.com, moved to wordpress.com and finally, in July 2009, I settled for wordpress.org. It has been a steep uphill learning experience.

Traffic

In the old days, I was all happy to have more than 50 people visiting my site  per day, now I get all frantic when my visitor count drops below 200 a day. Admittedly, traffic has slowed down to a trickle these Christmas days, but I’ve stopped worrying, since my stats are telling me that an increasing number of visitors are regulars, who come back again and again, which tells me that my niche has started to grow a following (perhaps among students too lazy to write their own literature reviews?).  Her is a more detailed review of the “top of the pops” on husdal.com: Traffic analysis 2009 – What are these people from India doing on my blog?

Networking

I’ve started to network with other blogs in my niche, e.g. Bob Ferrari’s Supply Chain Matters, Kevin Cornish’s @risk, Ken Simpson’s Contemplating…, or Paul James’ Agile Continuity, to mention but a few of those on my shortlist of blogs in supply chain risk and business continuity. I’ve also started to use LinkedIn Answers as a tool for networking, although the questions asked and answered there are getting more and more banal for every day. Twitter seems a much better tool. I’ve explored several blog directories, but I keep coming back to BlogCatalog as the best place to list one’s blog. While I get very little traffic from any of my blog directory listings anyhow, BlogCatalog delivers some 10% of my traffic.

Syndication and recognition

“Syndication” may be the right word for what is coming in 2010, since  I have been invited to join the community of Supply Chain Experts at Kinaxis as a regular blogger/contributor. The latter I attribute to my blog slowly beginning to achieve some recognition as a reputable and relevant resource in supply chain risk, as Matt Cutts of Google so aptly puts it.

Advertsising

Another sign of recognition are major supply chain players (i.e. consultants and software providers) asking for advertising space on husdal.com, realizing that this is where they may attract new customers, and advertisers relevant to my blog are always very welcome. This means that I can perhaps scrap the Google Ads that do not bring in much revenue anyway, and which may also hurt the integrity of this blog, since I do not control who advertises what.

2010 – what’s in store?

Frankly, I do not know. I can see that this blog will grow stronger and that I will continue to post as often in 2010 as I did in 2009. I foresee that the scope of the blog will narrow even more towards the academic side of supply chain risk. First by catching up on the many articles in my literature collection on supply chain risk and business continuity that have not yet been reviewed, and second, by finding more articles by the authors that have been reviewed already.

Best wishes for the new year and see you all in 2010!

Related

• husdal.com: Traffic analysis 2009

People versus Freight

Amazingly, the same thing happened last year, at least here in Norway. The news are always about the poor travellers who are stuck and cannot get anywhere, and the airlines or train operators not giving out any information, let alone compensation. While that is a sad story, what about all the goods that is transported now, just three days before Christmas. That too is stuck somewhere, but we rarely see news flashes of truck drivers stuck in snow, or perishable goods that has to be scrapped. That is not news that sells. But freezing car drivers, and freezing train passengers do sell.

Supply chain disruptions are the order of the day right now. Keeping supplies running is just as important as keeping people running. Let’s not forget about that. Without roads, let alone cleared roads, nothing really works.

Merry Christmas

As usual, I’m always late in sending my Christmas gifts to friends and family. This year is no exception, and I can only that my letters and packets will make it there in time. There’s only one thing left to say: Happy Holidelays!

Links

• linkedin.com: Holidays = Holi.delays?
• bbc.com: Cold weather cause travel disruptions
• bbc.com: Snow cause chaos at Luton
• bbc.com: Eurostar resumes services
• spiegel.de: Eis-Chaos am Airport Frankfurt
• tv2nyhetene.no: Værkaos i Europa

Related

• husdal.com: Oslo airport shutdown – lessons learned?

Thought leaders and rising stars

As with all books in the Harvard Business Review Paperback Series, this one too is written by the preeminent thinkers and the emerging experts of the field. There are eight separate essays or chapters, each devoted to a certain aspect of crisis management.

Each chapter is equipped with an executive summary that can be read before the article, to see if this is something worth spending time on, or after the article, for summary and refreshing one’s memory. Excellent. There’s also a very brief bio of the contributors (which helped me in locating my links below) and a keyword index.

As always, I did my best in trying to find a personal or company website belonging to each of the authors, but I didn’t find many, mostly because this book is almost 10 years old, so if any of my readers want to help locate the rest, or if my links are wrong, particularly if you are the author who is mentioned, please contact me).

Those who lived to tell

This is a book with three stories told by those who lived to tell how they survived a major crisis, and it is a book with three fictional crisis cases, where different management consultants weigh in on the options available and it is a book with two articles on strategic advice on how to and how not to manage closes calls and near misses.

One by one

Managing the Crisis You Tried To Prevent by Norman R Augustine is an essay about the six steps or stages of crisis management: 1) Avoiding the crisis, 2) Preparing to Manage the Crisis, 3) Recognizing the Crisis, 4) Containing the Crisis, 5) Resolving the Crisis, 6) Profiting from the Crisis. All with examples of companies that did well, and companies that did not so well, as Ericsson and Nokia are prime examples of.

When An Executive Defects by Anurag Sharma and Idalene F Kesner is  fictional case study about how companies should address the “defection” of an executive going to a competitor. Here, five experts of communication offer advice on how communicate with the media, with the employees and customers, with the “culprit”,  and how to protect intellectual property and manage knowlegde that is disappearing out the front door with a no-disclosure agreement.

A Strategic Approach to Managing Product Recalls by N Craig Smith, Robert J Thomas, and John A Quelch is a step-by-step guideline for product recalls, looking at the time before, during and after a product recall and what implications this should have on 1) Policy and Planning, 2) Product Development, 3) Communications 4) Logistics and 5) Information Systems. Again, with excellent real-life examples that will make you think. Here’s a recent reminder of things that can go wrong: Mr. Squiggles, as reported by Regester Larkin.

Right Away and All at Once: How We Saved Continental by Greg Brenneman is a fascinating account by the then COO of Continental Airlines, describing first-hand the five lessons of how he and the new team at Continental transformed the company: 1) File your flight plan and track your progress:  find your action plan, stick to it, and monitor your performance. 2) Clean your house: The people who brought the business in to the crisis are NOT the ones who are likely to bring the business out of the crisis, so sweep out the old. It’s brutal, but it works. 3) Think “money in” not “money out”: Cutting costs lessens money out, but it never brings money in. Find ways to generate revenue, do not seeks ways to minimize losses. 4) Ask the customer the right questions: What is it that they would actually be willing to pay for to use your services rather than your competitors’. 5) Let the inmates run the asylum: Engaging your employees in making work fun does not run counter to strong, firm and directing leadership. Treat their ideas and suggestions with respect.

Media Policy – What Media Policy? by by Sandi Sonnenfield is another fictional case study. Here a charity donation goes terribly wrong, as it turns out that the initial benefactor in turn has supported an organization that now has resorted to violence to make a political statement. How far does corporate social responsibility run and where do you stop being responsible for someone’s actions, and most of all, how do you handle the media who will love sticking this incident on your brand reputation, not for good, but for worse. Again, five media experts weigh in on what steps to take and discuss the components of an effective media policy. Sidenote: For a list of current “OOPS”es in Public Relations, Fineman PR’s list of annual PR blunders is a good read.

After the Layoffs, What’s Next? by Suzy Wetlaufer is yet again a fictional case, a complex story of mismanaged downsizing and of a defecting manager taking with him a seizable number of employees, a sudden unannounced closure of a major store, and the rest wondering what or who is next, perhaps a poignant but otherwise unrelated reminder of the SAAB demise. Nonetheless, the essence of this case is how does a company revive morale and survive under such circumstances? On a sidenote, Susan Wetlaufer has had her own share of crisis management to deal with. She is now Susan Welch, and in early 2002, she was forced to resign from the Harvard Business Review after admitting to an affair with the then-married Jack Welch, the former chief executive officer of General Electric, while preparing an interview with him for the magazine.

Leadership When There Is No One To Ask: An Interview with Eni’s Franco Bernabè by Linda Hill and Suzy Wetlaufer tells the story of how Eni, an energy-focussed industry group in 1992 became a prime target during Italy’s “Mani Pulite” or “Clean hands” anti corruption investigation in the midst of a structural re-organization. How do you leas a company through extreme internal resistance to change and extreme external scrutiny. Bernabé answer was to seek consultation, but to lead and decide in solitude.

Lincoln Electric’s Harsh Lessons from International Expansion by Donald F Hastings is an account of how Lincoln Electric failed miserably when they tried to expand their business in Europe and Asia, not realizing perhaps that the American way of doing business can not and will not work in Europe or Asia. The business culture is simply too different, and labor laws and regulations are often counterproductive to incentive systems aimed at improving performance. It was a bitter lesson learned, but a necessary lesson, without which the company would not be as strong as it is today.

Conclusion

The Harvard Business Review Paperback Series are not written for us academics and researchers, but for the professional manager seeking executive perspectives and solutions. That does not make this book less valuable; as a researcher it is always interesting to know what the industry is concerned with in order to focus my research accordingly. The best essay, in my opinion, is Greg Brenneman’s account of his time at Continental airlines, along with Norman Augustine’s strategic advice and the product recall issues. The fictional cases are interesting per se, but reading more or less the same advice five times by five different experts makes these essays a less capturing read. Nonetheless, I certainly know more about the inner workings and real challenges of crisis management than I did before, and thus, can apply it to the case studies and surveys I will conduct in my research.

Reference

Harvard Business Review (1999). Crisis Management. Boston: Harvard Business Press.

Publisher link

• harvardbussiness.org: HBR on Crisis Management

amazon

• Buy this book: HBR on Crisis Management

Related

• husdal.com: SAAB is no more…
• husdal.com: Book Review: Single Point of Failure
• husdal.com: Book Review: The Business Continuity Handbook