International corporate blogging practices and effects

Abstract

This study assesses international corporate blogging practices and their effects on the popularity of corporate blogs in terms of comments received and incoming links. Building on the blogging practices framework by Schmidt (2007b), a theoretical model is developed incorporating cause–and–effects relationships for blog characteristics and their impact, as well as international differences. The five Hypotheses are tested using a sample of 20 German, 10 Russian and 77 U.S. corporate blogs. The results of stepwise regression analyses confirmed most hypotheses regarding effects of blog diversity, blog authenticity, blog usability, blog sophistication and networking efforts. The theoretical and practical implications of this are discussed.