Peter Kim is the first to see the humor and irony in how he was introduced to blogs .. attempting to put out a blog flame storm for a client. However, it was a snow storm that was the catalyst for Peter launching his own blog, Being Peter Kim, which was to become one of the most highly regarded marketing blogs.
Blog Story Teller: Peter Kim, Being Peter Kim
Call me Dr. Strangeblog or: How I learned to stop worrying and love the blog.
My introduction to blogs was certainly a magical epiphany of marketing communications – akin to an atomic bomb detonation. One Monday morning in 2003, I walked in to work and by the time I walked out, I was the point person assigned to quash a global branding crisis. Somewhere in the world, rogue creatives had released a couple of sexually provocative ads featuring our products and logo – and they were gaining more attention every hour.
As the head of global interactive marketing, I was tasked with “doing something” about it. My advice? Leave it alone and let it die. The corporate response? Send a cease-and-desist to any entity hosting or publishing the images. When I told one blogger that “blogs are not a media outlet,” his ego went into overdrive. Eventually the meme died, but not before sales to our online store had jumped through the roof (!).
A couple years later, different firm. I’m head of interactive again, among other things. President: “We need one of those ‘blog’ things!” So I started one. It sucked. In retrospect, a blog wasn’t going to do much to bring back the 80’s for the core fans of that brand. But I did start a small blog experiment on the side…
I had been working in the space and recently started a job that made blogging a natural extension of my work. I finally joined the conversation in earnest in January 2006. It was the first of a few crazy snow storms that winter and the rest of my family was stuck in Palm Beach. What to do? Start a blog!
One of the biggest challenges – branding. What could I call this thing to signal it as personal and not raise the ire of my corporate employer? How could I signal that I realize, in the grand scheme of DNS, I’m just another navel-gazing marketer? Given that readers will see the world through my filter, I thought the riff on a 1999 movie title fit pretty well. So it stuck – “Being Peter Kim.” And the question I have heard more times than I care to count: “so, how is it, being Peter Kim?” My response? Read the blog!
Now after a year and a half of blogging, I’ve learned so much and love the dialogue. Will I ever stop blogging? Maybe. I put up my first web site in 1993 and that’s not around anymore. Maybe the medium will change to microblogging. Maybe photoblogging. Or maybe I’ll just revert to black ink on paper and fill up a bunch of Moleskines on a shelf as a palpable reminder of where I’ve been and what I’ve thought. But for now, I feel like this story has still just begun.
By the way - I still don’t think blogs are media outlets. Media as historically defined are poorly targeted one-way communication in transport vehicles being replaced by emerging technologies. I see blogs as conversations, two-way dialogue between individuals that were made for technology’s current evolution. Who wants to be a voice that people skip, block, and ignore?
Excellent blogger story, Pete and Toby! Thank you for sharing and inspiring.
Posted by: C.B. Whittemore | August 06, 2007 at 02:50 PM