Update: Blogging Adoption May Be Down, But Study Says It’s Still a Powerful Niche Tool

[This article is an update to “Social Media Study: Corporate Blogging on the Decline?” published last week.]

The Center for Marketing Research at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth last week released a study that showed blogging rates are down among companies included on the annual Inc. 500 list.

Even so, the study’s author maintains blogging is still a powerful tool to differentiate. It may require a bigger investment of time than microblogging or status updates, but in the right hands, it has the opportunity to help your company offer substance and stand out from the chatter available on other social media sites, according to Dr. Nora Ganim Barnes, Director of the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth’s Center for Marketing Research.

For content marketers, that means the opportunity in blogging lies in offering value added – namely, thoughtful original ideas, expertise, and analysis in a convenient format.

“The blog is evolving to more than posts of the latest headlines,” Barnes said in an interview. “Companies that understand the value of blogging for what they do are into thought leadership.”

Ford Motor Co., Comcast Corp. and Dell Inc. are examples of companies that have seen their business blogs attract an ever-expanding group of followers as they incorporate innovations to the format and guest bloggers, Barnes said. “There’s a market for content but not everybody is going to be in that market. It’s self-selecting,” she said.

Look for the Influencers

The use of blogging as a niche tool became clearer in Barnes’ recent study of the use of social media by Inc. 500 firms. The 2011 Inc. 500 Social Media Update found that the adoption of blogging declined among the companies that made this list for the first time since 2007.

One reason for the drop may be that some of the companies that appeared on the list are relatively new, and were formed after social media alternatives, such as Facebook and Twitter, became available. Blogging is the oldest and most mature form of social media, predating Web 2.0, Barnes said. “It may not be that they were blogging and gave it up. They may never have had it to begin with and they went directly to other tools that were more nimble,” she said.

Some of the newer companies that appeared in the Inc. 500 list may rethink their strategy and start adopting blogs as their businesses mature. If a company does choose to blog as part of a content marketing strategy, they should use Technorati and other metrics to survey the blogging landscape and discover where the influencers are, Barnes said.

“We may see a resurgence in blogging,” Barnes said. In forums, for example, there is “blogging in the context of this other platform. They’re still a moving target.”

Choosing the Right Tool

Not surprisingly, companies that do blog have found that the biggest challenge is the time and effort it takes to create original content, Barnes said. Going to content providers also has proven less “satisfying” than creating their own, she said, so companies are weighing the investment against using other social networking tools.

The move to using social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter don’t necessarily replace the role that blogs play; companies are simply starting to distinguish among the tools and decide which best fits their audience.

“There are more opportunities for customer communications, not less,” Barnes said. “Blogs do something that Twitter can’t: Thought leadership, analysis. They allow for longer and more thorough discussions. Companies don’t have anything to replace that.”

Further Reading:

Blogging Essentials for Content Marketing

Blog photo via Shutterstock.