Blogger’s Paradise

– By Steve Robins

The Solution Marketer’s Guide to WordCamp Boston

A great resource for anyone interested in WordPress, blogging or social publishing

This past weekend, I attended the inaugural WordCamp Boston at the Microsoft NERD Center in Cambridge, MA.  WordCamp was a great opportunity to dig deeper into the WordPress platform that powers The Solution Marketing Blog.  The conference offered a special bonus as well: ten years after the Cluetrain Manifesto was first published, two of the authors, Doc Searls and David Weinberger, participated in a discussion with the Boston Globe’s Scott Kirsner.  The conference had an interesting mix of attendees – both technical consultants/developers and business bloggers.  As is the case for most xCamps (ProductCamp, CloudCamp, etc), the atmosphere and program was informal, collegial and educational.

A Learning Opportunity For All

Even if you didn’t attend, soon you’ll be able to download slides and watch videos of each presentation.  Also check out the #wcbos Twitter feed – a virtual community of WordPress experts.

About WordPress

Much more than a blogging platform, WordPress is one of the top social publishing/blogging platforms today.  If your company is considering starting a blog or needs a CMS (content management system) to manage your website, I recommend that you evaluate open source WordPress.  You’ll also want to look at other social publishing options/blogging platforms such as Drupal, Movable Type, (both open source) and HubSpot (commercial SaaS), among others.  Traditional ECM players like EMC Documentum, Interwoven/Autonomy and Vignette/OpenText also provide Web Content Management offerings as well.

Solution Marketing Take-Aways on Blogging

If you’re a solution marketer, you’re probably interested in how to build an effective blog.  A few tips from WordCamp’s pros:

• Make it real. Create content that’s interesting to your target personas.  Remember, your target audience is interested in solving problems, not hearing about your products. And that’s why Solution Marketing is ideal for social media and blogging.
• Mix it up. Depending on your audience, you may want to offer a mix of posts –long and short, news and longer features, serious and funny, text, video and photos, opinion/provocative, and more.  For more, check out Karen Rubin’s presentation, Rock My Business Blog.
• Theme it. Blogs can actually take many forms, such as standard blogs, quality magazines, portfolios and more.  The form dictates the theme you use to control the look and presentation of your blog.

Great Conversations

I also had great conversations with:

• Margo Attaya, a web/print designer/developer
• Christine Green, an Internet marketing consultant
• Brett Bumeter, a biz dev and social media marketer
• Lane Bourn, IT whiz
• Rich Sands, who provides strategic marketing for platform adoption
• Todd Randolph, who helps companies integrate social media into their marcomm strategies
• Karen Rock My Blog Rubin of HubSpot
• Joselin Mane, Social media and tweetup master of LITBeL Consulting
• Deena Frankel of VELCO

Additional Resources

• More on social media – Check out Developing Your Social Media Strategy and other social media posts.
• Blogging – Breaking Blogger’s Block; Rock My Business Blog presentation (Karen Rubin, HubSpot).
• WordCamp Boston Program – Session descriptions and links to SlideShare presentations, videos (when available).