Big Business Blogging
(businessandblogging.com) The recent survey results indicating that “only”5% of small businesses have blogs made me curious about what the big boys (and a few big girls) are doing.
I took a look at the corporate sites of the top 10 Fortune 500 corporations.
Here are the results:
#1 - Wal-Mart - No blog
#2 - Exxon Mobil - No blog
#3 - GM - Multiple Corporate Blogs including the well-known Fastlane, in existence since 2005
#4 - Chevron - No blog
#5 - ConocoPhillips - No blog
#6 - GE - GE Global Research Blog, also known as From Edison’s Desk
#7 - Ford - No blog
#8 - Citigroup - No blog
#9 - Bank of America - No blog
#10 - American International Group - No blog
So, 2 out of 10 (20%) of the 10 largest corporations in the US have at least one corporate blog.
You may not have noticed it, but none of the CEOs of the Fortune 10 are women. I thought I’d also take a look at the 13 Fortune 500 corporations headed by women to see if there are any differences in the ways they communicate with their customers.
Here are the results:
#35 - Wellpoint - no blog
#59 - Archer Daniels Midland - no blog
#63 - PepsiCo - no blog
#125 - Sara Lee - no blog
#133 - TJX (TJ Maxx, Marshalls, etc.) - no blog
#134 - Rite-aid - no blog
#145 - Xerox - multiple xerox blogs since 2007
#282 - Alcatel-Lucent - no blog
#283 - Avon Products - no blog
#288 - Reynolds American - no blog
#363 - Safeco - no blog
#383 - eBay - eBay Developers Program Blog since 2004
#492 - Western Union - no blog
So, 2 out of the 13 (15%) of the 13 Fortune 500 corporations headed by women have blogs. There doesn’t appear to be much difference by the gender of the leader.
Overall, I found 41 of the Fortune 500 (8%) had some level of corporate blogging. We’re still researching that number because the blogs are sometimes challenging to find. And of course, new blogs could be being added as we write this.
In the coming weeks, we will be looking at each of these 41 corporations and the ways that they blog - the good, the bad and the ugly. We will look at what they are trying to accomplish and whether they have met those objectives.
We will be exploring which corporate cultures are a good fit with blogging and which aren’t. And what that means to their customers.
We won’t be restricting our search to the U.S., of course. We will also be looking internationally at the Global Fortune 500 to see if there are differences in how, why and where corporations blog and what they blog about.
There will be lots to see and learn - and we’ll be looking for your opinions too! So, let’s spend some time with the big boys (and girls!) and let them know how the rest of us blog!
Tags: blog, Blogging, corporate-blogs
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POSTED IN: Corporate
10 opinions for Big Business Blogging
Easton Ellsworth
Jan 8, 2008 at 7:14 am
Liz, nice to meet you. We’d love your help over at the Fortune 500 Business Blogging Wiki.
laura
Jan 8, 2008 at 7:48 am
Hi Easton!
We’ve already found the Wiki and we’ll be participating.
Would You Join … The Blog Council?
Jan 9, 2008 at 12:38 am
[…] (Business blogging pointer: your clients should be able to find your blog. For more information on large corporations that blog and those that don’t, see Liz’s post from yesterday.) […]
Bridget
Jan 10, 2008 at 7:09 am
I guess the Big Dawgs don’t have time to blog!
Liz Fuller
Jan 13, 2008 at 9:03 am
Hi Easton
It’s nice to meet you too - I really enjoyed the interview Laura did with you for BnB. As Laura stated, we’ll be updating the wiki as we go along with our reviews!
Liz
Big Business and Blogging | JobsBlog.ie
Jan 14, 2008 at 4:19 am
[…] From: http://www.businessandblogging.com/big-business-blogging/ […]
Nils Koenig
Jan 15, 2008 at 4:32 am
Hey Liz,
Actually WalMart used to have its LifeAtWalMart as a blog and also Ford cancelled its blogging activities (used to be at http://blog.ford.com/). However they cancelled. Here at Daimler we just started the Daimler-Blog three months ago and are in the process of analyzing our environment and especially how corporate blogging works bes. We identified a significant difference between small and big business as well. In my opinion, the underlying reason is the different goal. Small companies need the quick and easy PR, for big one that doesn’t matter. Here one has to evaluate the goal/performance relation. We developed a simple 3-step-model to make the actual success of big companies’ corporate blogs visible and comparable. As our blog is only in German, I tried to translate the presentation also into English: http://www.slideshare.net/DaimlerBlog/measuring-success-of-corporate-blogs
Liz Fuller
Jan 15, 2008 at 7:18 am
Hi Nils
Thank you for the link to your slides as well as the additional background on Walmart and Ford. It is interesting that you are in the early stages of developing your blog at Daimler.
Blogging is so new to corporations that we are currently evaluating whether they are even blogging on a genuine and consistent basis. It seems challenging and a bit premature to quantify their effectiveness at this point. Your 3-step-model is a good step in that direction as it attempts to normalize the comparison and the results. (thanks for translating!!)
I agree that small companies need the PR; I am not sure I agree that it doesn’t matter to big companies. I predict it will begin to matter more and more to big companies in the near future.
Thanks for your insightful comments. I hope to hear from you again.
Liz
john cass
Jan 16, 2008 at 6:16 am
I think wal-mart does have a blog, they launched something more corporate recently, I believe. Great post, glad that you will be able to help with updating the content on the Fortune 500 wiki.
Liz Fuller
Jan 16, 2008 at 7:52 am
Hi John
Thanks for the comment about Walmart. I will take a closer look. All I had found previously was WalFacts which I don’t consider a real blog because I couldn’t find any way to create comments.
And yes - we will be updating the wiki!! First review is GM tomorrow (01/17)
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