Glad you’re taking control of things over there to remove the spam and bring their blog up to par. Hopefully next time I can link to something you’re doing in a better light.

I think you can add personal insight and passion without sounding like a warmed over press release and without necessarily ‘stirring the hornets nest’ so to speak at the same time.

Here’s a fantastic example of a site that does this and is highly popular:
http://www.toprankblog.com/

Their content truly positions them as experts in the field (and they are).

Cheers,
Adam

Regarding the spam comments on the blog, I agree our blog has not been maintained as well as it needs to be. I have just joined the company and expanding our blog is one of my responsibilities.

You raise an interesting point about personal commentary on company blogs that I’d like discuss. I disagree with your statement that company blogs should not be opinionated. I believe that adding personal insight and opinion is what makes a good company blog. Forrester just wrote a report about how poorly BtoB blogs are doing because so many of them read like “warmed-over press releases” and they “stick to business/tech topics without adding any personal insight”. Our blog is about marketing in a social media world and we encourage our team discuss their thoughts and opinions on relevant news, campaigns and industry developments. When done professionally, I believe this type of open conversation involves the audience and helps a company become an important resource for their customers.

I welcome your feedback.

Brian Cavoli
bcavoli at digitalinfluencegroup dot com
Digital Influence Group

It’s also a challenge to get clients to understand the amount of effort required to keep blogs going – writing, monitoring, responding, etc. Great example of why that’s important, and what NOT to do!

There are still too many people who don’t realize the trick to making money online is no different than the brick and mortar world — real service, quality products, and personal attention.

I also believe a company’s blog is a great indication of their service level – an unkempt blog with spam and a lack of attention to comments in general is more than likely reflected in their workmanship.

Thank you for making others aware :-)

I think you are correct for posting this. You even went so far as to contact them about your concerns and issues, as well as provide valuable feedback about the spam status of their comment section. I think you did a great job of running that campaign and clearly the point of a “beta” is the application process involved. Screening out sites that may not be relevant or appropriate for a link from a client site is of course part of the job when you have the possibility of linking to a potentially poor site. That small barrier also invites people to submit a site that they have confidence in and hope it will get through the process.