The most well known form of social networking is blogging. It’s also the most mature, with the slowest amount of actual current growth, according to BusinessWeek (hat tip to Rich Becker for pointing this article out). The primary reason is that blogging requires commitment, not just of financial resources, but also of time and thought. This is not only true of blogging, but any social network activity, whether its getting noticed in Digg or Stumble Upon or opening a storefront in Second Life.

There are real resource issues for businesses:

Financial: If there is a physical presence to your new media effort, then don’t go cheap with a free blogger template, minimal advertising or shabby storefront space. Spend some money and create a nice landing page, a blog template or a storefront that works within your larger branding effort. Integrate your campaign. Circuit City worked with IBM to create a significant storefront million within Second Life.

Time: This is the big one. If you are a small business, you should prepare to have someone dedicated to your blog or other social network activity for at least eight to ten hours a week. Agencies serving their clients should ask for a 30-40 hour retainer. A larger company will need to commit more resources.

Thought: Part of participating in a social network is investing the necessary thought to create valuable information for the network. In essence, a business must have something to say. The next chapter deals with this topic in full, but from a resource perspective, this is not something to simply dump on the 21 year old intern. Senior leadership needs to be involved to some extent.

Failure to prepare for the necessary effort more than likely will result in a stalled effort. In Heather Green’s BusinessWeek blog entry about the blogosphere’s slow down in growth she writes:

Excited to try out a new way of connecting with folks online, people flocked to blogging. But after three months on average, most bloggers realize [that blogging isn’t for them]. Since the audience reading blogs continues to grow, this classic tech cycle of hype and maturity is good news for the remaining blogs. Those left standing are the influencers that attract audiences and advertisers.

And while Green is right, this does create a greater opportunity for leadership, it also means that the potential for an abandoned effort is greater.

In some ways it would be better not to start at all than to be seen online with a big social media effort that simply disappears or stops with a static blog or a non-participating avatar. Most mature new media users have seen these failed starts, and are skeptical of newer entities online. There increasingly is a wait and see period for newer players. A business must really commit to new media if it wants to succeed in this realm.