Beware the business blog: Seven ground rules

These guidelines for business blogs were written in early 2006, but still apply:

1. Blogs are forever — or at least their content can be captured and stored elsewhere, even after you change or update it, so don’t write anything you may wish you’d never said. South Africa has already had a few blog lawsuits for unkind personal comments. Defamation suits for blog comments are not rare in the US and UK. Embarrassment from ill-considered blogbursts (that’s an emotional outburst or diatribe on a blog) is universal.

2. Don’t cross the work-leisure boundary unless you have a very clear reason and strategy for doing so. If your personal blog discusses your employers, expect problems. Employees are regularly fired in the US on this basis.

3. A blog should not be exclusively about pushing a specific product, but it can be about the brand. If you use a blog as a marketing tool, make sure you aren’t using it purely or overtly to advertise products or services. However, the mere fact of blogging in your business capacity helps to build your brand.

4. Don’t let your slip show. If you are using a blog to position your business as a thought leader, resist the temptation to give too much detail about day-to-day activity in the business. Too much public scrutiny is as bad as too little.

5. Don’t steal. Cutting and pasting without attribution is the scourge of the internet. And remember, Google can spot copyright violation from one click away.

6. Don’t be boring. Nobody cares what you had for breakfast — unless it was extremely unusual, disgusting or alive. Even then, nobody cares unless you can out this experience across in a style that is witty, vibrant or outrageous.

7. Make the time. Blogging is time-consuming so, from the start, allocate daily or weekly time to updating your blog.