Company Blog Checkup: Kleenex

Thanks to Mark Goren for giving me the heads-up about this week's entry in the Company Blog Checkup Series; Kleenex's Let It Out blog. The blog is a bit confusing, because instead of being centered around Kleenex, it's centered around Kleenex's current 'Let It Out' campaign. So that means that the blog's life is likely tied to the length of the current campaign.

As always, let's start with the blog's content. The first problem is obvious; there's no pictures. None of the posts have pictures, and there also isn't a picture of the blog's writer. The subject matter of the posts is designed to start a conversation about sharing stories between the writer and readers. The writer attempts to talk about a subject or tell a story, then she encourages the readers to give their feedback, and 'Let It Out'.

Here's an example in this post about the power of forgiveness: "Have you forgiven or been forgiven? How did it change your life? What has been the impact in your life of this powerful emotion? I hope you’ll share because the power of forgiveness is a lesson worth learning from as many examples as possible."

I see a big problem with this approach, in that strangers don't typically want to 'Let It Out' to people they don't know and trust. Now if Kleenex had taken the time to create and build a vibrate community of readers for the blog first, then it could work. But I don't think that's something they have yet, considering that the 15 posts left since May 1st have garnered a combined 15 comments.

As with many other company blogs, posting is sporadic. Normally there's a new post every 3-4 days, but occasionally there will be a lapse of a week or more between posts. Again, perhaps the best way to grow your blog's readership, is to post regularly. This cannot be stressed enough, but I see so many blogs that don't follow this very simple step.

As for comments, the blog's lone writer, Maria, does a pretty good job of replying to them. For example, this post had 6 comments, and 3 of them came from Maria. Some of the comments are little more than a canned 'Thanks for letting it out', but still, Maria does a better job of addressing comments than most writers have so far in this series.

Finally, let's move to the sidebar. First, there's a very nice section for 'Meet The Writer', which gives a quick bio for the blog's writer, Maria Niles. This is a great touch, and one that I've mentioned other company blogs lacking in the past. But again, there's no photo of Maria. If the idea of the blog is to get readers to 'Let It Out', it helps if they can see who they are 'letting it out' to.

There's a section for 'Blogroll', but then there's no blogs or sites there. Hmmm.....the only thing there is an RSS button, and one for My Yahoo and My AOL. If you click on the RSS button, it takes you to another page that details exactly how to subscribe to the blog's feed. Nice touch!

Overall, Kleenex's 'Let It Out' blog is an average effort suffering from a few very common, and very correctable problems. First, Maria needs to start adding photos to posts, that alone would make the blog much more visually appealing. Then I would get on a regular posting schedule, 3 posts a week minimum, Tuesday-Thursday to start with. And finally, build out the blogroll with links that will interest readers. The big problem I see with the blog is that it is tied to the product's campaign, instead of the product itself. Going this particular route only works if the blog has a vibrant and enthusiastic community that is willing to support the concept. I just don't see that here.

On last thing, maybe it's just me, but I couldn't access the blog directly, I had to first select my country, then click on another link on another page to get to the blog. That's 2 hoops to make your readers jump through, when they were expecting none. Not good.

If Maria or anyone from Kleenex wants to discuss this Company Blog Checkup with me, feel free to leave a comment here, or email me, or both.

If you're a company that would like to hire me to do an extensive checkup of your blog, you can click here for more information on my blogging and social media consulting services.

And if anyone can think of a company blog that they want me to do a checkup on, feel free to email me, or leave a comment here as Mark did!


Tags:The Viral Garden, Marketing, Company Blog Checkup

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