Widget Wizardry - Part 2

     Armed with a tag cloud and an RSS feed spitting your company’s insights into the twitterverse, you might think you’re good to go. Don’t. Like most things, there is always something else you can do to make your social media presence more effective. The first of these is a flickr widget.

    Flickr, the photo-sharing site that’s zoomed to popularity faster than a Disney kid, is a great opportunity to display pictures of your company and what it does. Every blog looks better with a few pictures (hence our author photos, though I’m not sure anyone wants to see my face), and a business blog stands even more to gain by giving potential customers a literal window into how you work. If you trade in something that isn’t a material product (banking, internet work), take a camera and shoot some pictures of your building, or the company picnic. It might not be fascinating photojournalism, but it shows the human side of your enterprise, an aspect that has a hard time coming through monolithic corporate logos.

    As always, discretion is a must with pictures. A great photo can make the web rounds and win good PR, but a bad one will certainly move faster and get more attention. So make sure that nobody’s streaking or that a password/account information isn’t floating on the computer screen in the background. Still, even bland pictures add life to a block of text, and all you need is the camera you probably have sitting at home. Once you’ve got a few pictures, and have a better handling on putting media on your company’s web site, it’s time to jump to the next level.

    YouTube, and an army of clones, have essentially made video ever-present on the internet. That said, a well-made video is a sign that your business is connected with current trends and gives consumers a better look at who you are. Whether you want to make video a continuing part of your business depends on your field, but an introductory movie is always a good thing to have on tap. Shooting quality video is tricky, and you don’t want to provide the blurry, shaky headaches that are most of the movies out there. Either hire a video company (Shameless Plug: Sitepro offers great video service) or take the time to write a decent script and use good technique. Just like photos, a quality video is a boon, while a poor one becomes the laughingstock of the industry.

    Beyond these larger additions to your blog, there are countless other options that work best on a case-by-case basis. Whether you want to display your twitter feed live, or if you want visitors to take polls are options that should be weighed with ROI in mind. The goal of a corporate blog shouldn’t be to make a Facebook-esque interactive experience, but rather to create a source for information and branding for your interested customers. Accomplish this with flare, and you’ll place your business among the elite cadre of connected companies. It’s a good place to be.