Over the past few weeks, I've highlighted a few blogs that have succeeded in capturing the elements required for successful blogging – mainly developing content relevant to the customer or stakeholder.

Therefore, I thought I'd venture out to find the epitome of a poorly written blog. Needless to say, my venture was a short one as I quickly stumbled upon Hitachi Data Systems' ill-fated attempt at engaging the public.

As I meandered through Hu Yoshida's blog, what caught my attention right off the bat was the content. Written purely from an executive perspective, I had a difficult time keeping myself awake while reading about Hitachi's new storage widget or Yoshida's traveling experiences in and out of Heathrow Airport. What Mr. Yoshida has failed to do is develop content that is meaningful to the audience. Frankly, I don't know of too many individuals that would be compelled by Yoshida’s traveling experience. (yawn)

Compared to Ford's Bold Moves site, which includes controversial commentary and passionate feedback, Hitachi has developed a site that is bland and uninspiring. My suggestion for Mr. Yoshida would be to drop the Hitachi-centric and personal traveling posts and concentrate on developing content that emotionally engages the audience. In other words, make me laugh, make me cry, or make me angry; just do something to compel me to contribute to contribute to your site. Unless the content improves, you can bet that Yoshida will shut down his blog within the next 12 to 16 months due to lack of interest.

If you're reading this Mr. Yoshida, it would be great if you would contact me because your company has a compelling story and you're on the right track with blogging. I'd love the opportunity to help you take this strategy to the next level by tailoring your content to address the emotions and needs of your target audience.

Labels: Blogging

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Posted by Erik Jon Warila @ 9/18/2006 01:57:00 PM