A Content Management System

I have to admit I have never read much of Clayton Christensen's research or books ; but have always liked his theory of disruptive technology --- basically, a fancy word to say "a product or service that turns an industry upside down." Forbes recently ran an article about some of these "disruptive innovators" --- some examples, NetFlix, Google, Roomba, Skype...all changed the way people thought about an industry (movie rental, search, personal robotics & telecommunications; respectively). These innovations have taken down some industry giants (Blockbuster, AOL/Yahoo...etc.); I love most all of the Top Ten products that are featured in the slideshow here and am sure many of you also see the value of these products and services (who doesn't own or know someone who owns a I-Pod of some sort at this point?).

It is because all of these products solved a problem, much like blogging can do for an organization. While there is hype about businesses becoming involved with social networking (Facebook, Second Life...) it is hard for me to see where this solves a problem and produces a true ROI . While these may be good media outlets to run advertisements to a certain demographic, beyond that I don't see the business results (anyone disagree?). So what problems do blogging solutions solve? First, much like some of these other products it really levels the playing field --- in this case, within the search ranking arena--- no longer is it only those companies willing to spend thousands per week on pay per click (PPC) that are able to win search. Business blogging can do this for pennies on the dollar and a much higher return --- PPC is only getting about 1% of the clicks anyways.

What other problems can a blogging solution solve? Well, content management within an organization (being able to tap into your resources), improved customer relationships, better qualified leads (as they are able to disqualify themselves before moving forward with the ability to learn more through your blogs) and more. So much like NetFlix has solved my problem of constant late fees at the video store; blogging can save you and your business many of the headaches due to poor search rankings, poor communications and the misunderstandings that potential customers may have about your company.