ryan l.

Shel Israel dishes a little advice to the McDonald’s blog team on ways they can improve their pretty pathetic attempt (thus far) at joining the blogosphere. He breaks it down for us:

• Start conversation with your customers
• Talk about a day in the life of a franchise owner
• Ask your customers what they want from you
• Drop the corporate language
• Read other blogs and join conversations

And I’m going to take the liberty to add a couple of more:

• Since Shel won’t say it, I will — pick up the book Naked Conversations, it’ll help
• And on a serious note — post with frequency. Two posts in a week’s time is not enough.

I’m not really one to talk about posting with frequency because I know I don’t, but I’m not a coporporation with an image problem trying to leverage a new platform for repairing one. Like others, I wish them well. A blog can be a pretty damn useful tool for communicating with customers, but you have to use it properly. Hopefully after a little bit of practicing they’ll catch on. And as Shel noted, drop the corporate speak. Despite sounding too formal, it sometimes makes a person (at least me) stop reading and move on. Good luck McD’s.