Q: We are considering starting a blog for our Corporate and Continuing Education program. We would love to learn a few good examples of other schools already doing this. Could you suggest a few worth looking at in more detail?
A: Below are some blogs being posted by other LERN members. In LERN's view, blogs may not be the most effective way to promote your program, either B2C or B2B. Our experience with member blogs is that there are a number of problematic areas: 1. The maintenance of the blog is essential. It needs to be continuously updated in order to draw participation from potential readers. This can be time consuming, and the ROI is not always what you would want.Updates need to be made at least every couple of days to keep the content fresh. 2. Unless your readers subscribe to the blog, they are not likely to see it on a regular basis. This means you put a lot of time and effort into something that is not necessarily widely read. 3. Most readers don't make comments. Our experience with blogs in CE is that few readers use the blog to add content or contribute to discussion. Maybe that is because most CE blogs have "promotional" rather than experiential or informational content. Current wisdom is that webinars are the most effective way to generate leads for your program and that Twitter and LinkedIn are more effective in creating an interactive relationship with your prospective customers. If you are doing courses for the community and enrichment, Facebook is also a good strategy.