Cerado Launches Business Blogging Practice

May 2, 2005 -- It's a pity that the term "Customer Relationship Management" has become almost a cliche. Most of the organizations that refer to themselves as "CRM" companies are really providing things that are for management, and for the company...and not the customer. But business-oriented weblogs, or "blogs," are beginning to help change that.

A weblog, or blog, is a community-oriented Web site that invites participation and collaboration between the authors of the site and its readers. Originally used by individuals to keep online journals, blogs have arrived in the business communications mainstream in a big way within the past two years.

To this end, Cerado has launched a formal practice around business blogging. This practice assists organizations in the strategy, implementation, training, technology, execution, and continuous improvement metrics that are needed to use blogs as a tool to connect more closely with customers.

Blogs aren’t just a media or PR tool. Business blogs are being used by a variety of industries and companies to circumvent the media and the competition to connect directly with customers. Examples include:
- GM Vice Chairman Bob Lutz is writing General Motors' Fastlane blog.
- SUN Microsystems president Jonathan Schwartz is one of hundreds of employee bloggers.
- Many niche manufacturers (e.g., Clip-N-Seal) are connecting with their customers via blogs.

Although technologies such as Really Simple Syndication – RSS – and aggregators are important to enterprise blogging, the technology is not the real issue. To get the most out of a corporate blogging initiative, an organization needs to also understand the issues around, and develop the answers to, questions such as:
- What is our business blogging strategy?
- What are our customers, partners, and competitors doing in this area?
- What are the opportunities we have?
- How will we measure the benefits?
- Who will be involved from our organization?

Cerado will assist organizations in successfully navigating this process, enabling organizations to leverage blogs to grow their customer and partner communities. This includes ensuring an understanding of the process, as well as implementation of the tools and organizational strategy needed to connect with customers more effectively using this new medium.

Why Cerado?
Cerado helps organizations get closer to their customers. Going forward, business blogging is going to be a critical component of the strategy of any organization that really wants to develop real customer relationships (and not just provide CRM lip service).

Most importantly, Cerado has experience helping customers solve these issues. To do business blogging correctly, Cerado knows the full set of requirements needs to be addressed: strategy, training, implementation, execution, and continuous improvement.

Cerado's business blogging activities are headed up by Christopher F. Carfi, a CEO blogger whose work has appeared in Penton Media, AlwaysOn, and a variety of other online and offline publications. Cerado’s business blogging team also includes Lisa Stone, a journalist, blogger, and strategist who has blogged for the Los Angeles Times, and has developed and implemented business blogging strategies for organizations such as ALM|Law.com and Knight Ridder Digital.

More information about Cerado's Business Blogging offering can be found at: http://www.cerado.com/solutions05.asp

More information on Cerado can found at http://www.cerado.com

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