Blogs Aren't Magic - Just Easy

I was talking to a senior executive at a large, London-based web consultancy yesterday and she asked me about blogs, blog-hype and my service Managed Blogs. I went onto explain that there is nothing magical about blog themselves...

...they just make the web user-friendly (by giving people access to a very efficient CMS system at a very low-cost). Which is a pretty big deal.   And no, they don't do anything that hasn't been possible for quite some time now through chat rooms, forums, email lists etc. They just do it better.

The BIG deal is that they are EASY to use (as easy as Microsoft Word,probably easier) - and that's ushered in whole new groups of people who previously couldn't publish online and get fully involved in the web. In other words, the web's gone mainstream.

So blogs (and related tools) aren't really a technical innovation they are are a communications innovation, which is why they represent such a massive opportunity for the marketing industry.  Which is what Managed Blogs is all about.

Comments

[Bjoern Ognibeni]

Are blogs really that easy ? Of course, they are easy to read, but also easy to write ?

I am currently working on several projects to introduce weblogs in companies with non-tech savvy employes. There blogging suddenly looks pretty complicated: with HTML coding, picture uploads, trackbacks & pings and the ubiquitous comment spam that drives everybody crazy...

I wish blogging would be as easy as writing a word document (hey, since when is ms word easy ? *g*). But imho it still has a long way to go to get there.

Did you make different experiences ?

[James Cherkoff]

Hi Bjoern, hey are easy at the intro level. However, at the top-end, they do offer lots of functionality which can take a while to get used to. It's just a question of introducing it to your clients one step at a time....whilst you oversee the more complicated aspects, until the staff are up and running.

[Ty West]

Bjoern, I'm using Squarespace.com to host my blog (www.merelyhuman.squarespace.com). IMHO, Squarespace represents the ideal blend of customizability options and ease-of-use.