It was cool to read about establishment of the Blog Council in Brad Spirrison's "Tech Matters" column in today's Chicago Sun-Times. The Blog Council (created by Chicago's Andy Sernovitz, who founded the Word of Mouth Marketing Association three years ago) is a roundtable, and an exclusive one at that, for large corporations with major blogging presence. It's a place to share ideas with people in similar positions.
I get that. But some of the biggest and most respected names in blogging are skeptical. Being present as vendors seems to be the problem. And the necessity for the new organization in the face of so many other blogging organizations and conferences is also an objection. European blogger Nicole Simon wrote a great wrapup of the debate.
I guess I get it because I've been there. As I wrote in my comment to Simon's article, the situation reminds me of the National Council of State Housing Agencies. During five years as marketing director for the Indiana Housing Finance Authority, I participated in several NCSHA conferences. We had little problem keeping some discussions to ourselves, and no problem having vendors in other discussions. And the hundreds of vendors help to pay for the organization, which is the voice of state housing agencies on affordable housing policy in Washington.
In the world of old-line public relations, at least in the U.S., it's also analogous to the different missions of PRSA and the Council of Public Relations Firms, an association of the big guns. Moreover, if more major companies blog, more of the middle-market and smaller companies will also blog. And that's a tide that lifts all boats.
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