A reader emailed me with the following question:
I was wondering if you have a POV, on if a blog should live on a corporate domain name (ex. company.com) or if it would be better to have the domain name be different from the corp. (ex. companyblog.com)?
That’s a great question.
My answer is this: if the blog will get more links by being at an arm’s length from the corporate site, then I’d have it on a totally separate domain.
Let me supply a hypothetical example… If a life insurance company has a blog about health and wellness and it’s at www.stayinghealthy.com, that will garner many more links than one at blog.lifeinsuranceco.com, IMHO.
This may seem like an oversimplification, since I haven’t discussed the branding implications, but I believe the “link-ability” of the blog is what will give the blog a long productive life in the blogosphere. Anything else is peripheral.
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The better question may be, ‘When should a company’s website BE a blog?’ Advertising Agency Hill Holiday just replaced their site with a blog, essentially choosing a conversation over a brochure to win new clients. I’ve done the same with my website – I ditched it and now direct prospects to my blog.
It doesn’t work for every business, of course. But if we think of a blog not as a separate site, but a publishing tool that encourages social interaction, the fun part is when we don’t think of blog and site separately, but begin devising instead ways of integrating social networking into everything we do online, letting conversations take place on the product pages of online retail catalogs, in the FAQs or tech support pages on product suppliers’ sites, following news articles and restaurant reviews, even within search listings.
Why are we working hard to silo off conversations rather than integrate them into every customer touchpoint?
Great comment, Mike! Someday in the not-too-distant future, “blog” will leave our vernacular and ALL websites (except a few remaining stragglers) will have blog features embedded into them. Trackbacks, pingbacks, comments, etc. will be as integral to the next generation of websites as Forms and JavaScript are today. I’m looking forward to that!
I think keeping the word “blog” out of the url would be a wise choice.
I would definitely put it in a folder on your corporate site. Never make it a separate site. you lose all the connection between your blog and corporate image. Well I think most people have figured this out by now.
Why a folder. What is wrong with making it seperate?
I think the URL is a great way to arouse the interest of readers and a marketing strategy that would help your company. Names that seem to convey the goal of the company can also be considered as an option.
Many corporate institutes are using internet for excessive marketing through different channels .
I second “Internet Marketing” (comment no. 10) its better to have multiple blogs on various platforms so you can target a wider audience.