A blogging experiment: Setting my dad loose into the blogosphere

setting up a blog about wine for my dad

My Dad is 56. He works as a field marketing manager for a wine company and has done for about five/six years. He’s got a Mac, loves them. He’s got a great knowledge of wine and often does tastings. I accompanied him to one at Burton on Trent wine society last week and on the drive back to London we got talking about how he loved doing tastings, attending wine events etc but that he lacks a focal point to bring people back to. Sure, he has his business card with an email address and a phone number but nothing to document all the wine knowledge in his head, the tastings he’s done, the massive wine events attended and the trips abroad to see vineyards in action.

My social media brain was whirring and I thought this is a great opportunity. My dad has something interesting to say, a subject he’s passionate about and he does interesting things with that subject. I need to get my old man blogging.

We sat down on Sunday morning with a piece of A4 paper and we planned it. First of all I showed him some blogs and how they worked, he was impressed. Then I asked him a series of questions:

1. What do you want to call the blog?

2. What is it going to be about?

3. How often are you going to update it?

4. What sort of content will you be putting on?

After that we went back to the web and we looked at some other wine blogs to get a feel for what they were doing. Some were really impressive while others seemed very out of date.

Dad decided that he wouldn’t be able to update his blog that often, due to work commitments but that he would have some regular features. We chopped his content up around categories (reds, whites, roset, sparkling, wine of the month, tasting reports, insights) and he started to plan his content for the next month or so.

We got him a wordpress blog to start off with, didn’t buy a domain or hosting as he needs to get used to it all first. He put in his first post about his wine of the month, he cropped a picture and uploaded that. “This is pretty easy”, he said. After that he wrote up a tasting report from the Burton wine society tasting and he learned how to link directly to another website (in this case we were linking directly to Tesco, Laithwaites etc where you can buy the wines that he used for the tastings).

In the first 48 hours of operations the blog has had more than 50 views, Dad was astounded. Also if we put ‘walkers world of wine’ into Google it was in the number one spot. We also got Dad a twitter account and linked it up to his mobile, so now he can twitter about wine or twitter about wine events that he’s at (like all the big trade tastings). 

In the space of a weekend, my Dad now has his own website and can update it easily and regularly. Of course I’ve got a log-in as an admin in case he’s got any problems, but he should be fine. He can start creating content about a subject he loves and sharing it with the world. It made me wonder, how many other experts are there out there who aren’t sharing what they do?

View Walker’s World of Wine blog or follow my old man on twitter

Tomorrow’s News, Tomorrow’s Journalists: If I had a million dollars to save journalism

The above was the question posed for the November debate on Tomorrow’s News, Tomorrow’s Journalists and I gave my answer as ‘I’d invest it in people’.

The post is here, or you can read it below:

First off, I’d rather have a million pounds (British Sterling) than dollars to save journalism with. But exchange rates aside, let’s get down to business.

My strategy would be to invest in people. Invest in getting journalists to do that saving. You can’t do things alone, you need a good team with good people. I’d probably shed some dead wood from the news room, maybe coax a few people to leave early and get some fresh blood in.

I’d keep the subs, but expand their role to include a lot of backroom stuff – like picture uploading, digital media production, video editing. I’d keep the print edition but I’d make it follow online’s lead. Maybe just have one good strong print edition per day, and throw everything into online.

I’d develop strong supplements based around local issues, and not be afraid of trying something new. I’d link these supplements with mini-sites online built around that issue.

I’d invest in training for my staff, I’d employ the Google technique of 10% time for my reporters. i.e. 10% to go off and cover what YOU want and what YOU think needs covering.

I’d put a bit of money towards having trainees in. Not expecting them to pay for everything. There would be a pot of money so that kids can come in and get experience, learn about being a journalist, in a good environment, and not be skint afterwards. You never know, they might even bring a good story in with them – and that’s got to be worth the money.

I’d invest in a CRM (customer relationship management) system for my newspaper, logging user comments, offering them personalised news updates, and beginning to build an idea of who my readers really are. So I know that Joe Bloggs in the North of the city responds well to this type of news. Then I have something to sell, I’ve got proof of effectiveness, readership and grabbing people’s attention.

So to sum up, good journalists, probably better paid, more of them, getting some 10% time, with a good online setup.

links for 22-10-2008

Finally got through my feed reader backlog this evening, here’s a couple of highlights that are leaping out at me right now:

• Your marketing is (most likely) dated

Good call from Adam Singer, and I think we’re reviewing everything we currently do at work and changing tactics pretty soon.

• 25 ways to build your community

Chris Brogan with some great tips on how to build up your blog and build a community around it

• How to launch a group blog project

More from Brogan about a group blog and how to do it. Currently considering something like this to be used at work right now.

A blogging shout out

Just thought I’d give a shout out to our Give It A Go blog. We’re running our second Give It A Go event at the Students’ Union where I work and back in February we sent Emily Davies, our small but very tough news reporter off to ‘give it all a go’, and now she’s back again for two weeks of fun and frolics, with a few lectures in between.

We think that blogging the two weeks of great activities that happen across the Union is the best way to show off just how much is going on, and allow students the chance to comment on the events and give their reaction. While our official Give It A Go site is more about showcasing the events and providing an events listing of what’s on.

A journalism blogging network for the under-30s?

My buddy Dave Lee has been suggesting setting up a blogging network (about journalism) for those under-30. Sounds like a good idea to me. His barriers to entry are:

a) Under 30-years-old. I know there will be a couple of disappointed people out there with this restriction, but without it I feel we lose the point a bit.

b) You blog (or plan to blog) about journalism in some shape or form. Bit of an obvious one, this, but I think it’s important that we’re all coming from the same place here. I’m not bothered what stage of you’re career you’re at, so long as that career’s journalism.

c) You promote the ring! If we all bring attention to this by shouting it from the rooftops, then there’s no reason why this can’t become the best point for young opinion on the media on the web.

Sounds good to me, I fit the criteria and dropped Dave an email – so I await more details with anticipation.

Why blogging is important to journalists, writers and business

Great post by Adam Singer over on Future Buzz about journalist’s using blogging as an entreprenerial tool. He’s right, blogging is the best platform for people to write about what they care about. Every local newspaper needs to start learning some lessons as local bloggers could technically start covering their ‘patch’ better than the big-boys.

Search for a theme

Well, I finally took the plunge and bought some hosting and setup my own little corner of the web. It’s about time. Now, the big challenge. Where to get a decent wordpress theme? I want something that is pretty swish, but easy to manage, install and allows plenty of flexibility. Any ideas? I quite like Mr Dickinson’s style, and Dave Lee’s isn’t bad either.

This wordpress 2.6 is pretty damn good as well.