Blogs, Like PowerPoint Presentations, Can Be Boons Or Banes

Sometimes I think blogs are nothing more than online, personalized PowerPoint slides. 

Think about it. You’re making a business presentation, and the goal is to get across information in a way that engages the audience, in a format they can easily understand. That’s exactly the standard for presenting information in a blog. As with any tool, if you use Power Point and blogs skillfully, you accomplish what you set out to do.  If you don’t know how to use the tools – well, let’s just say they can become an obstacle.

Last year, PowerPoint celebrated its twenty-first birthday. Technically, blogging’s been around as long, but blogging for business has begun to pick up real steam only in the last three to four years.  Robert Gaskins, co-creator of PowerPoint, defending the technology against its critics, explains that “PowerPoint presentations were never supposed to be the entire proposal – just a quick summary of something longer and better thought-out.”

Each blog post is like one slide in a PowerPoint.  Just as Gaskins said, it’s not supposed to be “the entire proposal”.  The blog should offer just enough information to entice readers (see Blogs, One Click Away From Colossal) to subscribe to the blog, or to come back to visit for the next “slide”. The “call to action” you incorporate in your blog leads readers to your website when they’re ready for more complete information.

In great presentations, the PowerPoint is there to support the speaker, not the other way around. The audience connects with the person, not with the slides.  In "Creating Buzz With Blogs", veteran business technology consultant Ted Demopoulos explains, “Blogs create buzz because people will feel like they know you, and people like to do business with people they know”.  Blogs represent people talking to people!