Converge Weekly

Corporate America’s executive suites have been infiltrated by the blogosphere.

The blogosphere, that chattering world of bloggers and social media networks that has become a generally accepted barometer of public opinion, has become a force that businesses cannot ignore. Now, even public companies, who traditionally limited access to their corporate information to credentialed journalists and research analysts, are realizing they need to embrace this new channel of information to their customers, investors and other stakeholders.

To address this new reality, most companies have formed social media teams and many are reaching out directly to bloggers — providing them the same access they provide to major media outlets.

In the last few years Prudential Financial, based in Newark, has transformed its web-based newsroom into a customer and blogger portal. Bookmarking and social media links allow visitors to easily share what they view; and Prudential has invested in high quality content for the site. Their professional quality videos, podcasts, webcasts and documents are designed to encourage visitors to download and share Prudential’s material.
ACCESS GRANTED

They also give bloggers access to executives and invite them to all media events.

“We are a financial services company, and that’s the way we approach it,” said Bob DeFillippo, chief communications officer for Prudential. “We wouldn’t approach it like Dell, or Disney, or a utility or a consumer product company like Johnson and Johnson.”

New Brunswick-based Johnson and Johnson has a slightly different approach. In addition to hosting meetings with executives and bloggers, the company has had vibrant blogs, www.jnjbtw.com and www.kilmerhouse.com, for the past three years.

“One of the original reasons we put together the [blogs] was that we realized a lot of people were writing about our company, our products and our industry,” said Marc Monseau, who works in the communications department and is the author of one of the blogs and the Twitter feed, which has more than 3,000 followers. “We try to provide information that will provide additional insight or content that people will find is useful for their lives.”

Staid and cautious, 106-year old Public Service Enterprise Group and Public Service Electric and Gas, its utility subsidiary, have just started to develop a social media strategy to engage the bloggers who follow the company, as well as web site visitors and employees.

After analyzing how their company is covered on the internet, and looking at how other utility companies and corporations are using social media, they are starting with baby steps, launching an internal blog and a YouTube channel this month.

“This is a deliberate decision to start with the internal blog to raise the comfort level of the executives, or to determine if it is not acceptable for a company that is more conservative,” said Paul Rosengren, a director of communications at PSEG.

By monitoring the internet, the communications team recently identified 30 websites and writers from around the country who cover PSEG’s green initiatives.

Last week it invited this group of bloggers, marketers and online journalists to its first blogger media event, focused on PSEG’s alternative energy programs. Six people came and four executives made short presentations on their projects in the company’s suite at the Prudential Center before a Devils’ game.

Tom Staples, president and co-founder of www.coolerplanet.com, a consumer-oriented solar panel resource, traveled from Seattle, Wash., for the event.

“This was the first time that I have seen a utility like this put out the effort to tell people about their green initiatives,” said Staples, whose site gets 150,000 visitors a month.

For the executives and the communications team, the evening was educational.

“What we learned from this exercise is that there is an interest on the part of bloggers to meet with executives,” said Paul Rosengren, a director of communications at PSEG. “We think that our next event will be in Washington where there are a lot of DC-based environmental people. We’ll have a breakfast with our CEO later this year.”

Source: nj.com