Fear Not the Blogs

WASHINGTON, D.C.—I am part of an active team that provides “blogger relations” support to a client that generates a lot of interest among diverse audiences. It’s a challenge that mixes passion and flexibility with relationship building and diligent media monitoring.

What is blogger relations? In essence, it’s about creating mutually relevant and useful relationships with bloggers who have some connection to a client or organization. In its most successful form, it is an open channel for honest two-way dialogue.

We work in a challenging and sometimes contentious online media environment where messages and opinions don’t stop or sleep. If I don’t empty out my RSS reader regularly, I may have thousands of blog postings piling up in just a day or two.

For some, this uncontrollable, infinite content push might create hesitancy and fear. If we cannot stop or control bloggers, then why should we engage them?

The simple answer is because blogs have large, relevant audiences and, like traditional media, represent the same readers we try to reach every day.

But bloggers are not information gatekeepers like newspapers and TV stations. They are interpreters. The information is out there for everyone to see – the press releases, products, competitors and critics. It is the bloggers who create context around content, describing the world and a brand’s place in it as they see it. If we do not engage them in this process, we forfeit any role in the interpretation of our own identities.

Bloggers are independent types. They don’t like being told what to think or what to write. As PR people, our engagement must always be from a place of humble, honest dialogue. The most we can ask for is a fair shake, and chances are if we ask, we just might get it.