Why organizations use blogs?

A strong debate still exists on how useful blogs are within organizations. It is noted that for blogs to be effective two issues have to be carefully examined: the first one is technical and the second one is cultural. The blog has to be useful and exactly fulfil the organization role, thus the information provided must be accurate and reliable. Blog developers should provide equal importance to the design and to the content of the blog.
Blogs can be very advantageous for organizations:

1. Consumers, suppliers and the society are in general better informed.
2. Bogs are the perfect space for the society to share ideas with the organization
3. Blogs are a very cheap and efficient way of communication (e.g. In obtaining direct feedback from allover the world)
4. all of the above help to develop strong relationships with customers leading to brand loyalty.

Despite all the advantages, organization may find several disadvantages in using blogs:

1. Blogs are easy to start, but so hard to manage. Following day to day writings is so much time consuming. This will result in outdated blogs reflecting a negative sign on the organization it self.
2. People find it difficult to express their ideas in public and in writing.
3. Since it is available to the public many opinions are expressed and some of them could be inappropriate showing the wrong image of the organization misleading its role and mission.

http://icmusings.blogspot.com/2006/03/future-of-blogs-in-organizations.html

http://archive.websitenotes.com/websitenotes-37-20040823BlogsandBloggingAdvantagesandDisadvantages.html