The Best Security Manufacturer Blog

By IPVM Team, Published Jul 15, 2016, 07:20am EDT

3 years ago, we first called this blog the best. It remains. Plus, we add an honorable mention.

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Manufacturers suck at honest, informative communication online. The marketing machine seemingly demands continuous spin and fabrication. Either that or they simply give up and say nothing.

However, there is one manufacturer blog that is so good that it is in a league of its own. While you might think this must be from the fast moving surveillance sector, you would be wrong. Surprisingly, it comes from one of the old-school areas of the business - door hardware.

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Comments (16)

Avatar

Armando Perez

IPVMU Certified | 07/15/16 11:52am

I know Chris (I'm sure many here do as well), stand up guy. Totally legit and damn good at what he does. That is 100% him and ipvm is spot on on the assessment.

Undisclosed Manufacturer #1

07/15/16 02:48pm

IDH is a good one.

While many factors go into a good blog, IDH reinforces my belief that a key elelement of success is having someone with industry knowledge and experience at the helm.

So often we see blogs run by individuals with marketing/social media skills, but little to no knowledge of their specific industry.

Other Manufacturers should take note.

John Honovich

IPVM | In reply to Undisclosed Manufacturer #1 | 07/15/16 04:46pm

IDH reinforces my belief that a key element of success is having someone with industry knowledge and experience at the helm.

That's a good point. Thanks for mentioning that.

It is the same pattern with trade magazines. You are not going to get a lot of people to read if the reader knows way more than the writer.

Undisclosed #2

07/15/16 03:25pm

Lot's of manufacturers have their own 'corporate' blogs - and it appears as if most of them do it simply because they think they should be doing it - probably because their industry PR vendor told them that by writing about industry stuff, they can be viewed as 'thought leaders'. While this phenomenon certainly can happen, the majority of corporate blog writers never really pull it off - because they are not really writers.

As you mention, blogging has been around for a long time. And my primary objection to most blogs is this: just because someone can write words in complete sentences does not mean that they should consider themselves 'writers'.

Writers need to have a certain 'style' - and above all else - the words that they write need to be interesting enough for readers to engage with the story they are telling/writing about. It's actually that simple, imo.

I am not even into door hardware - I know virtually nothing about the specs and regs and all the stuff that Ms. Greene writes about in her IDH blog.... but I find her writing style engaging and interesting - and I read her stuff. Note that she will engage with her readers via comments (which I have used), as this article mentions. She seeks out interaction.

I am also not in sales - though I have at least some background in this field. Mr. Peterson's blog is a different animal than Ms. Greene's. He writes in the 'life-lessons' style where his story-telling attempts to show how some 'every day' things - seemingly-unrelated to sales - have 'taught' him stuff that has made him better in sales. Note that Mr. Peterson does not have comments on his blog. He is not looking for interaction.

Both writers at least appear to have a purpose - whether or not I like or dislike the individual styles they use. The problem I think most blog writers have is that it is difficult to understand why they even bother writing anything. i.e. they don't appear to have a purpose.

Undisclosed End User #3

In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 07/16/16 02:54am

Blogs are done for SEO (Search Engine Optimization). That is why manufacturers do it as with many large integrators.

Undisclosed End User #3

In reply to Undisclosed End User #3 | 07/16/16 03:51pm

If you don't think companies have blogs to help there SEO, then you need to study modern day marketing.

Does it help SEO? Depends. Companies start blogs but then hardly every write a blog article after writing a couple. This does not increase SEO. It also depends if they are promoting that blog article theough social media and other means after article is published. The blog, if done on a regular basis, will create traffic to your website on a regular basis. The reader will spend more than a minute reading your blog and possibly click around to your other blogs and webpages. This is decent SEO. The blogs are not usually directed at deep learning industry things. A lot of blog articles, after being out for a while, are actually found in a search engine from a student writing a class paper or from sales people from within the industry or outside the industry doing research on the company. The type of traffic to the blog does not matter, as long as they spend time on that blog and click through to another page on your site/blog. I see some companies make a mistake by not having their company blog on their domain, but on another domain similar to their domain.

Marketing Companies that specialize, or supposedly specialize, in SEO like to get companies to start blogging to increase their SEO. They get them going, but the blog stops getting timely blog articles for a couple reasons. The company does not renew it's $1,000 to $4,000 a month contract with Marketing company so Marketing company is no longer writing about cheesy blogs and/or that Marketing company is not putting deadline pressure on company to create a new blog article anymore.

Truthfully, I hate the word SEO, due to unqualified SEO companies. However, SEO means a lot to a company because people google everything and being on the 1st page means everything.

SEO is a reason why you see companies blogging about employee health, company events, processes, and etc.. It boosts SEO and promotes a company image. Even if a blog article only received an average of 10 hits a month, that is still 10 more hits than if that article was never written. Now add all the articles up, it is a lot more hits being counted by search engine algorithms (Similar to RMR- as it adds up over time). Just make sure the content in your article title aligns with the information in your article, and your SEO should be positive (Prevent Clickthroughs). SEO is a more complicated than what I described, but this is the gist of it when it comes to company blogs.

Undisclosed #2

In reply to Undisclosed End User #3 | 07/16/16 04:35pm

"The blog, if done on a regular basis, will create traffic to your website on a regular basis."

Ridiculous. This reminds me of the Don Lapre marketing methodology. You point out how the marketing process works and infer that this simplistic statement is all that matters... i.e. the content itself doesn't matter for success. I absolutely disagree with this.

Who is going to come back on a 'regular basis' if the content - which they've learned from their prior visits to this website - is not valuable to them in some way?

I'm not saying that blogging can't be a part of a successful marketing and/or SEO scheme campaign... I'm saying that imo the content is the most important thing, and without quality/valuable/interesting/entertaining content the marketing scheme methodology fails miserably under the weight of it's own lack of any real value.

Undisclosed #4

IPVMU Certified | In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 07/16/16 08:22pm

Who is going to come back on a 'regular basis' if the content - which they've learned from their prior visits to this website - is not valuable to them in some way?

You know all those really great blogs out there packed with valuable posts that no one has ever heard of?

Me neither.

Undisclosed #4

IPVMU Certified | In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 07/17/16 10:54pm

FYI, U3's post was to answer your

The problem I think most blog writers have is that it is difficult to understand why they even bother writing anything. i.e. they don't appear to have a purpose.

And for me, it did a decent job. I don't think it was meant as a challenge to your "content is the most important thing".

Therefore I believe your interpretation of his words as "marketing is all that matters" is overreach and presumptively uncharitable.

Undisclosed #2

In reply to Undisclosed #4 | 07/18/16 01:18am

In his lengthy reply he completely ignores the content of the blogs - which leads me to believe that in his mind, it is not an important part of the reason companies have blogs.

Further, every reason he gave for the failure of marketing/SEO campaigns is largely due to the short-sighted customer who balks at paying the marketer on a regular basis for benefits that - due to whatever - are hard to quantify.

If the marketers customers are regularly doing this then either the marketer hasn't set the appropriate expectations or the marketers marketing is not helping the customer.

Which is why my reply focused on the fact that processes alone will never work without the quality content to keep the engines going and the customers coming.

Organic blogging works because the people doing such enjoy it. It is an outlet for them. Add in 'interesting writing' and that is the recipe for success, imo.

Inorganic (fake) blogging will always be seen for what it isn't, and any SEO benefits will be marginal at best - even in aggregate.

Undisclosed End User #3

In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 07/18/16 02:12am

Marginal SEO is not better than no SEO for a manufacturer or integrator? Tell this to the Search Engine algorithms when it comes to site ranking.

Having a blog and keeping up with it will give you more than "marginal" SEO as long as you put a little social media effort into it when a new blog article is released.

I never said content did not matter without expanding on it. As long as someone clicks on a link to your blog, and spends more than a minute in your blog, then you increased your SEO. If they click on another link within your site, then you further improved your SEO. What hurts SEO is when simeone clicks on a link to your blog and then clicks back out within a matter of seconds. Either the blog title was misleading and/or the blog was was not what they were looking for or the blog was garbage from the onset.

Website content (Main content) is very key to getting good SEO. Your content needs to match with what you do. Blog content on your website can be a little different. Your articles do not have to be just about security but it needs quality content to keep a reader for more than a minute. Quality is relative to who you are and what you're seeking. Someone does not have to create content for the same people to come back over and over. People can find this content through social media marketing, Search Engines, or company researching (Sales people do). What might be good SEO for a manufacturer could be terrible SEO for a true sole purpose blog. Now if you could create solid blogs on a consistent basis as a manufacturer or integrator... then you have it made unless that is costing you a fortune in salaries and your ROI is not panning out...as you still have to close the customer.

A very strong ranking for an integrator in a local area is key for potential customers contacting you for business. Now closing that potential customer is another subject.

Marketing and Sales are related...but they are completely different.

Undisclosed #2

In reply to Undisclosed End User #3 | 07/18/16 02:19am

maybe U4 was right then - I was being presumptively uncharitable....

cuz unlike your first long post, I got no beef with any of this one. :)

Avatar

Marty Major

FLIR Security
In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 07/16/16 01:58pm

"Writers need to have a certain 'style' - and above all else - the words that they write need to be interesting enough for readers to engage with the story they are telling/writing about."

Undisclosed #4

IPVMU Certified | In reply to Undisclosed #2 | 07/16/16 03:49pm

"Note that Mr. Peterson does not have comments on his blog. He is not looking for interaction."

He does have a comments link, which is odd.

Maybe Chris doesn't know the link doesn't work?

Avatar

Chris Peterson

Vector Firm
In reply to Undisclosed #4 | 07/22/16 03:31pm

Sorry for the delay - I've been on vacation for a week.

First of all, I'm flattered by the mention - thank you. To address a few comments...

Our comments tool is not enabled. I think I would do a poor job responding in a timely manner to comments. I travel quite a bit, and most of my writing is done in batches when I'm in the office or hotel. My marketing consultant and I decided that it would be better to disable the comments rather than disappoint commentators with tardy or no replies. As you might note, most of my posts are unidirectional and not promoting a discussion ... just sharing content.

I don't use our blog for SEO. SEO isn't a strategy for us because not many people are searching for "security sales consulting". I wish they were! The purpose of our blog is to offer free content to give readers an insight into my style, and to create exposure to what we do. Most of the visitors are subscribers and those that click the links from our social media posts.

Thanks again.

Dan Droker

LONG Building Technologies
IPVMU Certified | 07/15/16 03:51pm

Totally agree! I have been reading iDigHardware for many years (even won a drawing and got photos featured there a couple years ago). I have gained so much knowledge and confidence in my understanding of door hardware and codes that I am often the only one in construction meetings who can make sense of the hardware specs and head off problems resulting from poor specs.

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