Naked Conversations: How Blogs are Changing the Way Businesses Talk with Customers: Amazon.ca: Robert Scoble, Shel Israel: Books

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The New Rules of Marketing and PR: How to Use News Releases, Blogs, Podcasting, Viral Marketing and Online Media to Reach Buyers Directly by David Meerman Scott

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This item: Naked Conversations: How Blogs are Changing the Way Businesses Talk with Customers by Robert Scoble
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.ca.
Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over CDN$ 39. Details
The New Rules of Marketing and PR: How to Use News Releases, Blogs, Podcasting, Viral Marketing and Online Media to Reach Buyers Directly by David Meerman Scott
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.ca.
Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over CDN$ 39. Details

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Product Description

From Publishers Weekly

For the past five years, Microsoft employee Scoble has maintained one of the most popular blogs on the Internet. Mixing personal notes with passionate, often-controversial commentary on technology and business, his blog is "naked"—i.e., not filtered through his employer's marketing or public relations department—a key part of its appeal. In this breezy book, Scoble and coauthor Israel argue that every business can benefit from smart "naked" blogging, whether the company's a smalltown plumbing operation or a multinational fashion house. "If you ignore the blogosphere... you won't know what people are saying about you," they write. "You can't learn from them, and they won't come to see you as a sincere human who cares about your business and its reputation." To bolster their argument, Scoble and Israel have assembled an enormous amount of information about blogging: from history and theory to comparisons among countries and industries. They also lay out the dos and don'ts of the medium and include extensive statistics, dozens of case studies and several interviews with famous bloggers. They consider the darker aspects of blogging as well—including the possibility of getting fired by an unsympathetic employer. For companies that have already embraced blogging, this book is an essential guide to best practice. (Feb.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

Scoble, a video blogger for Microsoft, and technology guru Israel have put together a bible for business bloggers. Drawn from their own experiences, as well as from numerous comments posted to their blog (http://redcouch.typepad.com/), they have produced a book with the conversational style of blogs. Starting with a brief history of -Word-of-Mouth- products such as the ICQ global instant messaging service and web browser Firefox, and placing blogging firmly in this context, they state that blogs are -Word-of-Mouth on Steroids.- Included are interviews with company bloggers from the technology industry, of course, but also from various other businesses. Scoble and Israel outline the right and the wrong ways to blog in a business context (e.g., don't say anything you wouldn't say directly to a client or the company VP) and provide basic advice on blogging generally and on related emerging technologies. The key points of the book are that blogs are better than traditional one-way marketing because they allow instant two-way communication with customers, developing a loyalty unmatched by other marketing endeavors. In fact, if a business doesn't blog, its customers will abandon that company in favor of one that does. This book should be in all public libraries and academic business collections.—Robert Harbison, Western Kentucky Univ. Lib., Bowling Green (Library Journal, January 15, 2006)

For the past five years, Microsoft employee Scoble has maintained one of the most popular blogs on the Internet. Mixing personal notes with passionate, often-controversial commentary on technology and business, his blog is "naked"—i.e., not filtered through his employer's marketing or public relations department—a key part of its appeal. In this breezy book, Scoble and coauthor Israel argue that every business can benefit from smart "naked" blogging, whether the company's a smalltown plumbing operation or a multinational fashion house. "If you ignore the blogosphere... you won't know what people are saying about you," they write. "You can't learn from them, and they won't come to see you as a sincere human who cares about your business and its reputation." To bolster their argument, Scoble and Israel have assembled an enormous amount of information about blogging: from history and theory to comparisons among countries and industries. They also lay out the dos and don'ts of the medium and include extensive statistics, dozens of case studies and several interviews with famous bloggers. They consider the darker aspects of blogging as well—including the possibility of getting fired by an unsympathetic employer. For companies that have already embraced blogging, this book is an essential guide to best practice. (Feb.) (Publishers Weekly, December 5, 2005)

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4.0 out of 5 stars Naked Conversations, Dec 20 2006

By	J. Estill "www.jimestill.com" - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

On the Flight down, I read Naked Coversations by Shel Isreal and Robert Scoble. I had heard Shel speak at the Association of Internet Marketers. I always like reading books from authors I have heard speak.

It is an excellent book. I am passionate about business blogs. I truly believe they have value for a business. The book re-affirms this. Naked Coversations is easy to read, fast and well organized. It combines advice on blogging (and why blogs help companies) with stories of real bloggers.

Blogs have dangers but those dangers tend to be over rated. Not blogging is a greter danger. As I have said many times, blogs are a new media. Companies that ignore it do so at great peril. At the same time, blogs cannot be blatant self or company promotion - readers (and other bloggers see right through that and can decimate a company).

This book ranks an 8 out of 10 on the Jim Estill Scale (and I am a tough marker). How do I know if a book is good? If I make a change as a result. I turned off word verification on my blog to make it easier to comment (I still review all comments and don't let spam through but am trying to make it easier to have a conversation). I get twice as many emails as comments on my blog as a result of my blog. The book drives home that comments and coversations are good.

I also know a book is good if I buy multiple copies for people that I think should read it. And in this case I did.

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4.0 out of 5 stars Read this before you blog for business, Oct 29 2006

By	Nathan Schock (Sioux Falls, SD United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

What do you call a low-cost tool you can use to communicate with your customers, investors, employees and other stakeholders individually and simultaneously? Naked Conversations co-authors Robert Scoble and Shel Israel call it a blog.

Both "A-List" bloggers, the authors admit their bias as "blogging champions" who deem blogs essential for business. They passionately document the right - and wrong - way to blog. Their advice ranges from the broad, be authentic - not corporate, to the specific, how to choose a title for your blog.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of businesses (including 40 companies from the Fortune 500 list) have jumped on the blogging bandwagon. How do you know if it's right for yours? The bottom line is this: If your customers want a blog, you better start one before someone else starts one about you.

Although the book was written as things like RSS and podcasting were just emerging, much of the advice in the book will not soon be dated. If you think a blog might be right for your company, this book belongs on a short list of resources that you can't afford to ignore.

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4.0 out of 5 stars Extraordinarily Insightful, Jul 3 2006

By	Michel V. Lenoire "MVL" (Ontario) - See all my reviews

Enjoyed this book immensely. It opened my eyes on the world of blogging and why I should be interested. Particulary like the last section describing the new technologies that will be affecting the blog world. As a result of reading this book, I have suggested to a number of my colleagues that they look into blogging.

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