Dec
29
2005
Only 3% of Fortune 500s are blogging according to the Fortune 500 Business Blogging Wiki
Posted in the Category of Case Studies and Fortune 500 Blogs and The Corporate Blogging Book
The Fortune 500 Business Blog Index, a much needed resource, has launched -- just in time to add to the book! (Note: it's a wiki, so anyone can add updates to it.) The index is the result of a joint effort between Chris Anderson and Wired and Ross Mayfield of Socialtext. Learn more from Chris, writing here on his Longtail blog. According to the calculations of Wired's interns, only 16 members or 3% of the Fortune 500 have blogs. You can download the Fortune 500 blogging spreadsheet they created.
Chris's theory, which hatched during a dinner with Doc Searls, is as follows:
"Perhaps, Doc wondered, the risks and uncertainties of public business blogging are so great that big companies only do it under duress, when their other corporate messaging has lost traction. So companies on the way up don't want to mess with their success by introducing a new lens on the enterprise that isn't controlled by the PR department. But companies on the way down are willing to try anything to regain the confidence of their customers."
And the evidence thus far, after an initial look at the Fortune 500 blogging index:
"(We) found only 16 members (3%) of the Fortune 500 with business blogs. And, for what it's worth with such a small sample size, the average trailing 12-month share performance of the blogging members was +5.7%, while the non-blogging members was +19%. So although the statistics aren't good enough to confirm Doc's theory, they do point in the right direction."
And the 16 Fortune 500 bloggers are:
Amazon, Avaya, Avon, Cisco, Dell, EDS, Ford, GM, HP, Microsoft, Motorala, Oracle, Sprint, Sun, Texas Instruments and Boeing.
[via Jim Turner]
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Comments
Blogspotting said on December 31, 2005 at 10:53 AM
If a magazine is cutting staffers, can it afford to increase blogging?
If a company is laying off workers, can it afford to dedicate more resources to blogging?
exoskeleton said on January 2, 2006 at 12:54 AM
Only 3% of Fortune 500 Companies Are Blogging
Very interesting statistic grabbed from here. The 16 out of 500 which are blogging, according to this site:
Amazon, Avaya, Avon, Cisco, Dell, EDS, Ford, GM, HP, Microsoft, Motorola, Oracle, Sprint, Sun, Texas Instruments and Boeing
What does that me…
BlogRevolt.com said on January 4, 2006 at 05:25 PM
What’s Behind the Fortune 500 Business Blog Index?
I was the writer that Chris Anderson and Wired originally hired to produce an article suggesting that Fortune 500 companies usually only start blogging when they’re in trouble. The article was prompted by highly-inconclusive (as it turned out) data ass…
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David H. Deans said on January 22, 2006 at 10:14 AM
Debbie, based upon my own experience with both large and medium-sided companies, I have formed the opinion that it has more to do with their “communication culture.”
Also, many company executives simply don’t believe that they are thought leaders in their space, or that they have someone on their team that has something really meaningful to say to the marketplace or their customers.
Moreover, when you look at the content on the same company’s internal intranet portal, you also find evidence to validate their concerns.
Therefore, is it not wise to avoid creating a corporate blog, under those circumstances?
David Maister said on February 4, 2006 at 07:02 AM
Mr. Deans hit it on the head: the low occurrence of corporate blogging is almost certainly not an oversight, but a set of conscious decisions. Even some of us novices to blogging get it that a blog will only serve if it takes risks, calls things as they are, takes non-hedged positions, abd reflect a clear personality, etc.
There are two or three interesting questions that flow from this: (A)No one person (except the CEO) could blog on behalf of the entire coproration (or service firm)and hence the cultural issue is can the firm live with multiple representatives or firm members all blogging from diffreent perspectives - what does this do to corporate traditions of managing a consisten image? (B) Is the CEO really the right person to do it? There are some fabulous examples out there, but a case could be made (in line with JIm Collins’ Good to Great research and my own in Pactice What You Preach)that actually the CEOs job is to make OTHER people look good and not (as business culture has had it since Lee Iacocca) keep the focus of external constituencies on the big boss.
What would really be fabulously constructive in busineses large and small would be for the CEO / managing partner to be active on an “internal-to-the-company” blog, interactignwith all the troops. Now THAT would transform the business culture of the firm in a hugely beneficial way.