> Thought leadership = unlimited platform for delivering a message

The client: Adele Revella, Buyer Persona Strategist

The situation:
In late 2006, Adele Revella, the world's foremost expert in using buyer personas for effective product marketing, wanted to develop a program that would allow her to showcase her expertise and encourage previous clients to implement her ideas. She needed a way to easily introduce people to her approach, her work as a consultant, and generate interest from people who might attend her two-day Effective Product Marketing seminar.

Adele brought David in for a two-month Blogging to Build Business engagement. The engagement began in September 2006 with a research and discovery phase. We looked at other blogs in the space and developed plans for the sorts of things that Adele wanted to say on her blog. Meeting several times a week via the phone and trading many emails throughout September, we worked together to name the blog "The Buyer Persona Blog" secure www.buyerpersona.com as the URL, develop a tagline "How marketers think like the customer to win their business," brainstorm on a graphical blog masthead, and organize the blog's physical layout. We also discussed tagging and category names that would appeal to her audience and developed a comment and trackback policy.

Over the course of several weeks in October, with password protection on her blog so she could experiment a bit, Adele wrote blog posts with David providing support, guidance, and cheerleading. Then in late October the blog went live. David continued to support Adele with tips on blogging etiquette and help with the more advanced aspects of posting with trackbacks, imbedded photos, and blog widgets.

The result:
Adele is thrilled with the return on her investment. She says that no other marketing initiative could compare with her blog for its capacity to reach other thought leaders and directly communicate with current and potential customers.

What the client says:
"David gave me an unlimited platform for delivering my message," says Adele. "Now it's up to me to continue to leverage that investment."

"While thought leadership comes naturally to me, delivering my work through a blog was a really new idea, and I couldn't have done it without David's experience, insight, and guidance. I had heard many people say that blogging is like writing an email and copying the world, which is why I was resisting. I certainly wanted to get my message out to a bigger audience, but I didn't want the world to watch me stumble around until I got it right. With David looking over my shoulder, I had the confidence to jump in and get it going."