The Red Couch
-How and why business should blog
By Robert Scoble & Shel Israel
With help from the Blogosphere
Overview
The Red Couch explains the why and how of blogging to business people. Using recent case studies throughout its 250-300 pages, it will demystify this disruptive technology and explaining why it is more efficient, credible and effective than traditional business communications tools and explains why it is likely to change or destroy the usual marketing mix of ads, PR, websites and collateral materials.
Based on at least 50 interviews with people at all levels and in all sorts of businesses, the Red Couch intertwines some of the experiences of its two authors, one of whom is Microsoft’s leading blogger and the other of whom is a veteran marketing consultant. It argues, in compelling terms, why blogging is not just another tactical communications distribution channel, but rather, a new strategic medium for drawing companies and their constituencies closer together for the benefit of both. The Red Couch provides a quick survey of the powerful but simple tools needed to get started, then illustrates how the are used to improve a company’s business and it provides finer points to mastering the new medium.
The authors will discuss why traditional marketing tools——press releases, websites, advertising and so on have become less effective even as they become more expensive and why some may never work again. It explains why its good business to shake off traditional taboos, such as praising competition, publicly discussing product prior to official launch, and allowing mid-level employees to blog without traditioBnal business filters.
The business community is already aware of the increasing ubiquity of blogging, but as happens during nearly all technology revolution, it is the slowest to adopt innovation, the longest to use it once adopted, and the place where it will prevail only if it can continuously and favorably impact the bottom line. This is as it should be, and the The Red Couch will explain how companies that adopt blogging will prevail in the next chapter of global and local business adjustment, and those who do not are likely to face the same fate as the village blacksmith who ignore the early automobile.
Target Audience
The target audience is any business decision maker as well as any business marketing consultant. It will be of value to CEOs, sole proprietors, CMOs and any in-house marketing staff. But it will also be valuable to mid-level employees involved in product development, customer support and human resources because The Red Couch explains how to blog without getting fired for being candid.
Outstanding Features
The authors believe they have access to the best-known business bloggers and the heads of large companies who allow blogging. They are hoping to include exclusive interviews that may not be available elsewhere.
Most of this project is being executed in the public eye, via The Red Couch blogsite. The authors expect to gain input, wisdom, useful criticism and content from its visitors. In a way, they are co-authors. This intentional transparency of our business project is in part proof-of-concept, but it also has enormous awareness-building attributes.
Timing, Scope and Size
The authors expect this book to be completed by mid-September. It will be between 250-300 pages in length. The authors hope to have this book on store shelves in Q1 06, precisely when they believe businesses will be reaching a crescendo of awareness about the need to blog.
Competitive Analysis
TK from Robert
Promotion/Marketing
Both authors hold superior credentials in promotion and marketing.
Israel was a PR executive for more than 20 years and has 10 years journalistic credentials. He has been involved in more than 10,000 interviews during his career. As a consultant he continues to advise senior executives on media and conference presentations. He is an occasional presenter at conferences and has been interviewed on radio and in print.
Scoble, is Microsoft’s best-known blogger and is frequently a speaker at a growing number of conferences. He has experience in conference promotions and is among the most sought-after bloggers for interviews. In recent months, he has received prominent coverage in Fortune and Fast Company magazines, has been scheduled to be a keynote speaker at (Robert fill-in), and has been interviewed for audio blogs (podcast) internationally.
Both are adept at the interview and are willing and eager to participate in press tours to business and tech business publications who have a high likelihood of covering this book, not only because the authors are known, but because of the currency and controversy of the subject matter.
Post-publication, the authors intend to conduct a book-seeding campaign of more than 100 volumes, putting The Red Couch into the hands of business, technology and blogging influencers, to whom they have clear access.
Authors
Robert Scoble is Microsoft's best known bloggers, with over 3.5 million visitors to his main blogsite annually. During his day job he helps run Microsoft's Channel 9 website and can be seen with his camcorder taping interviews and getting people inside looks at Microsoft's people and technology. He started blogging in 2000, when he helped plan the CNET Builder.com Live conferences in the late 1990s and two speakers, Dave Winer and Dori Smith, told him that blogging was "hot." Within a few weeks he'd been invited to Steve Wozniak's Super Bowl party. He is a former marketing director for UserLand Software, a developer and marketer of blogging and knowledge management software. He was a sales support manager at NEC, where he answered phones and email for the mobile devices division learning the value of customer relationships. Earlier, as an editor for Fawcette Technical Publications, he helped plan the VSLive and CNET Builder.com Live conferences. In high school, he learned the basics of word-of-mouth retailing while working behind the counter of a San Jose, CA camera store.
Shel Israel has been consulting innovative, early phase technology companies, mostly start ups for more than 20 years. He is editor-in-chief of Conferenza Premium Reports, the leading newsletter covering technology conferences, where technology trends are often first spotted. In the span of his career, he has played a key role in introducing some of technology’s most enduring products including: SoundBlaster, PowerPoint, Filemaker, MapInfo and Sun Microsystems workstations and more. He played pioneering roles in the introduction of such technology categories as Desktop Presentation, Desktop Mapping, PC Sound, PC Databases and e-tailing. Most PCs today contain one or more products, Israel helped to introduce.
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strong>Contacts
Robert Scoble
RScoble@Microsoft.com
(425) 205-1921
Shel Israel
shel@itseemstome.net
www.itseemstome.net
(650 )591-4911
