FIR’s Trust In Blogging Panel

Josh Bernoff's new report on blogging discovered that only 16% of online US consumers trust corporate blogs.

Neville Hobson & Shel Holtz invited me to join a panel discussion on their BlogTalkRadio show and For Immediate Release podcast.

Rather than abandon the idea of blogging completely, the group discussed what strategies companies should use to connect with their customers and communities using social media.

This conversation was very timely for me because I've been thinking a lot about the purpose of lists that feature companies using social media or blogs.

Here are a few lists; Rachel Happe, Peter Kim, Debbie Weil, New PR Wiki, and Twitter Brand Index.

(if you know of more let me know, I will add to this post.)

Those lists indicate which companies are using social media, and do very little to rate the how well a company is deploying an engagement strategy within social media. The fortune 500 business blogging wiki lists blogs, and also links to a list of independent blogger reviews so there's some value in the reviews in gauging which companies are conducting engagement effectively.

My recent post on finding social media engagement leaders is an attempt to both develop a methodology for determining what a social media engagement leader and build a list of successful engagement leaders.

Check out the FIR trust in blogging panel podcast.