Thomas Quinn was the former CEO of Community General Hospital in Syracuse, NY. For 4 years he had a personal blog where he talked about community developments his hospital was a part of, highlighted positive things employees and physicians did, and talked about philosophical and health care issues such as compassion. I always enjoyed reading it, especially since it was a local hospital, and I liked knowing what was going on.
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When he was needed the most was the final year he was CEO, which was also the final year that the hospital was a standalone, before it merged with University Hospital. While many hospital executives might have tried to keep the news quiet for fear of what the community might think about them, Quinn was front and center in talking about what was going on with the merger, with the unions, about the employees and how they were trying to save all jobs, and of course with his personal thoughts about why the hospital needed to move in this direction.
When the merger was complete he wrote his final post and moved on, but many people who followed his blog thanked him for keeping them in the loop; communities with hospitals feel a very close connection to them, and though I’d only visited this particular hospital a few times it felt like a local piece of history was going away.
While there have been reports of more corporate CEOs stepping away from blogging, it’s interesting to see the names of people who are blogging these days. Many believe that CEOs can bring a different perspective to their businesses and industries, especially in today’s world where many people believe top executives in many companies are heartless monsters who only care about how much money they and their companies can make. Some of those names include: Bill Marriott, Marriott International; Mike Critelli, Pitney Bowes; Mark Cuban, Landmark Theaters and the Dallas Mavericks; and John Mackey, Whole Foods (although he shares his thoughts along with other company employees).
CEO blogs are very popular, especially for big name companies. They drive traffic to the blog, which means traffic to the site. The more traffic the site gets, the better it ranks in search engines, although many of these people probably aren’t worried about that aspect of business. After all, their companies are already well known, but having CEOs blogging about their business and sharing their thoughts brings a different perspective to the company that the masses seem to love.
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What many of you probably don’t know is that I’m a CEO who blogs. I might be self employed but I’m also incorporated, and officially my corporate blog is called Mitch’s Blog. I started blogging based on something I read by Chris Pirillo, who’s also the CEO of Lockergnome.
I think it’s great having CEOs blogging, but blogging isn’t just for CEOs. If you’re hoping to establish a presence online to market products, services or yourself, you really need to be blogging. Even though it can take some time to put articles together, it’s the most cost effective type of marketing you can do for yourself, and it’s relatively easy to promote. Not that he needs any push from me, but most of you who read this blog already know about Ryan Biddulph of Blogging From Paradise; he’s made a pretty good living all started by his massive blogging output, even if I still can’t figure out how to pronounce his name. lol
Here’s a few more CEOs or famous names you might know of who blog:
Richard Branson, Virgin Group
Craig Newmark, Craigslist
Caterina Fake, Flickr
Reid Hoffman, the co-founder and executive chairman of LinkedIn
If these folk can blog, why aren’t you blogging?
Hey Mitch,
Such a great Post and ton of info!
I never thought about Bill Gates having a blog.
That’s super cool!
There might be even more CEOs blogging, but I didn’t want to go out of my way to try to find them. If those guys have time to blog there’s no excuse for anyone else.
Blogging has become a power tool or medium these days to express one’s feeling & thoughts. In fact it is one of the most effective way of digital marketing. If possible everyone should blog. This is really a nice topic shared here, thank you.
Actually, blogging’s always been a powerful medium. It’s just that many people thought blogs were only diaries; took a while for some of them to learn the truth. That’s why CEOs can make their businesses sparkle and look big time by blogging and promoting their products and services.
Hi Mitch,
Thanks for the mention!
Blogging feels like a no brainer for anybody who wants to share their thoughts on a broader scale. From CEO icons like you mention above to small business owners to individual bloggers, we all have such a fun, neat platform through which to help folks through blogs.
As more folks become aware of blogging – and how to do it right – we will see the number of bloggers grow, for sure.
Thanks again buddy. Really appreciate it.
Ryan
Glad to do it Ryan; you’ve made quite a career for yourself writing pretty much everywhere! As I told Santanu, tons of people have known about blogs and blogging, and the numbers show how many people have given it a try. They need more inspiration to continue though, something that CEOs could easily help with, while at the same time giving their businesses quality promotional opportunities.
Blogging is great and we can use blogging to open more opportunities. For me blogging is better than time deposit and it can also be another option for early retirement that is why i recommend other to have their own blog because blogging for me is the best way to express and also to earn in the same way.
Blogging is indeed great and can open up a lot of opportunities. It’s also great to keep in touch with those who we’re hoping will buy services or products from us, as well as educating them as to what we do.
Mitch,
What are some examples of small business CEOs with good blogs? Do you have any? I feel like the people you listed are already celebrates before they start blogging.
Thanks,
Zach
Truthfully Zach, there’s no way for me to answer this well. There are a lot of sole proprietors like myself who blog but I’m not sure how many there are with 20 people or less. I know Mario Forleo is one and possibly Derek Halpern but these days they’re pretty big names. Then again, that’s the point of it all; start small, start blogging or making videos and if you catch on you can expand your business.
Interesting. I didn’t realize that all those CEOs blogged. I realized that Guy Kawasaki. We are just getting restarted with our blog. Just wrote blog post #3 and hoping this is the start of something great.
I wish you good luck Joe. If you have any blogging questions I’m sure I’ve probably answered them somewhere on this blog; just do a search. 🙂