it@cork

Event Report

Blogging for Business? Isn't that a contradiction? Aren't blogs just something that nerds do in the privacy of their bedrooms?
No longer, blogs have exploded on the business scene, much the same way web sites did in the 90's. In a recent cover story, BusinessWeek said of blogs "they're simply the most explosive outbreak in the information world since the Internet itself. And they're going to shake up just about every business -- including yours"

it@cork held the first Blogging for Business event in the country in the National Software Centre on 9th of June.
Maura McHugh gave an introduction/overview of the blogging scene and Dr. John Breslin spoke on how blog content can be fed to mail clients, news readers, websites using syndication
Richard Delevan told us about Authenticity, Authority and Audacity or how the audience perceives the voice in the blog and finally Tom Raftery explained Blogging and Search Engine Optimisation - how a blog can put your site in the Google top 10

Richard Delevan's very entertaining and informative presentation included wonderful quotes from Jonathan Schwartz (CTO of Sun Microsystems):"It will be no more mandatory that [CEOs] have blogs than that they have a phone and an e-mail account. If they don't, they're going to look foolish" and Robert Scoble (CBO of Microsoft)

"Tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. If your competitor has a product that's better than yours, link to it. You might as well. We'lll find it anyway"

At this event, blogs were demonstrably shown to be a business tool to boost search engine rankings for companies, to increase a companies online reach (through RSS syndication) and to project a more human face on a company's website.