Is blogging good for business? or is it too hard, expensive, time consuming...?

I just visited a potential client / employer for a short interview. This is a security company that supposedly has a great product. They also claim to have great technology which is very unique. The story is one you and I have heard a few dozen times, maybe even hundreds of times. Small to medium size company, moving along at a decent pace, hit a "bump on the road", fell "off the tracks" and slowed down, coming back from "a setback" but sure to "make it to the big times again" ... OK, OK, OK I am getting a little wordy, but this is a story that we all know. So getting back to the title of this story... this marketing VP was telling me that "we have been thinking about a blog for a year now. We started writing stories and finally realized that we can do it. Now we are not exactly sure if this is something we can "keep up on"..." or something like that. McDonalds sells Hamburgers and Fries and they have a blog. The Democratic Party sells ideas that we are not sure about, and changes it's mind, they have a blog. But this Internet security company ends up spending more money, time and effort on paper brochures to put in their lobby and mail out to customers than inform customers or potential buyers on their updates and new discoveries.

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A static web site for Internet security
So this is a ridiculous example? Not really! Actually, it's a very typical example. It takes a long -> long -> long -> time for technology AND the implication of it's use to BUSINESS (read make money) to be seen. This we all know, not just from Internet applications, but from steam shovels and hydraulic ones of 50+ years ago. But there is also something that may be bigger. Like the 'slower' evolution that is actually a bigger trend, there is something that the 'general business' writers and teachers don't talk about much. Is the communication among new technology community members. Tim O'Reilly has been blogging for a long time. Actually, his blog has turned into a newspaper column more than anything else. I say that because it is no longer a 'off the cuff' personal writing source as much as a well written and well PRESENTED site. But you still see "old school" marketers and business manages make excuses. So what to do? Well, it's a little like the 'who moved my cheese' story (book on Amazon). But it's also a little like moving a little faster to get thing done better.

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I use to make fun of the slow movers when I thought I was the 'early adopter'. Than I realize that just being an early adopter for the sake of trying things out and boxes full of gadgets and software boxes in the basement was not all it's cut out to be. Now I am back to pushing more adoption. Because in some fields we don't have any choice. In Internet technology field and in many business fields that depend on fast information transfer, the blogs, wikis and quick authoring pages are not necessary but they do SELL more. They also change the way customers work with us and the way we work inside the company. For some, new technology is like what was described almost 20 years ago by a co-worker: running down a hill, losing your breath, and the hill keep on getting steeper! Why? I think it's because lots of us all over the world are running on our own little hills, and when we see others having fun before they crash down at the bottom, they start running too. But also, it's the unleashing of a bunch of technologies all at once. Some of them trivial like faster communication and better transport. If computers hardware was not being made so economically in Asia, we would probably not be able to do even a fraction of the software we can do. Well... I can go on and on, but basically the message is: get moving with what you think is "new" sooner than later. Even if it seem hard to 'keep up' right now, it usually turns out that it is not. And if you are not sure, just start small and don't tell the whole world about it... quite yet... which in the end, will make you laugh and seem foolish... but that is the nature of running down a hill that won't stop... there is good news here too... so come back to the next post... good news from the leading edge...