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Dell’s first-week of blogging is complete, and I think they are going a great job. There is always room for improvement so here are a few upgrades focused specifically on the flaming laptop entry that I posted on Dell’s blog.

Lionel,

Great job on joining the conversation! It’s a great start…

Here are a few thoughts on how you can make upgrades to corporate blogging activities based on your post about the flaming laptop:

1. Make Your Posts Actionable. The post on the burning laptop (flaming laptop) missed a window of opportunity in terms of creating an actionable framework to deepen dialogs with individuals that have an interest in these issues. The longer term corporate blogging strategy is to connect this group to future Dell corporate communications efforts. You can do this by:

A. Encouraging individuals to sign up for your RSS feeds
B. To include a specific date on when you’re going to provide an update. This is incredibly important. It’s like scheduling a message board forum with a guest speaker.
C. Provide people with your email address. One-way lists don’t work for long. The new communication model is about being of service rather than just servicing a list for corporate gain. The “being of service” message is Web 2.0/Word of Mouth marketing industry fluffy messaging. The bottom line is Dell is a business. Now that Dell is blogging, you have a great opportunity to create your own viral audience platform to support message distribution or corporate communication goals.

2. Follow the Conversation. Two key takeaways here:
A. I would strongly recommend that you tags (use keywords to help with indexing posts in search results for phrases people are using) for every post in addition to category or top tags.
B. Dell needs to be doing outreach and commenting on blogs that are talking about the flaming laptop with links back to your site. Even simple “thank you” posts to bloggers can go a long way in starting new relationships.

Again, congratulations and welcome to the future.

Todd Tweedy
CEO
BoldMouth

TAGS: Dell, Flaming Notebook, Flaming Laptop, Blogging, Corporate blogging, Lionel Menchaca