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Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

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Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#41

Post by foob »

What are peoples' thoughts on the marketing effectiveness of quality relative to quantity in blogging? We have recently started publishing what we consider to be very high quality material (the majority of them have front-paged on HN if that's any indication). Most of these have been published on [1] so far but we're in the process of transitioning to a more official company blog [2].

A close friend who really knows his way around marketing has been advising us to write more fluff pieces. We're really torn over this because we strongly dislike vapid content as consumers. I would be really curious to hear any anecdotes on the relative merits of the different strategies.

[1] - http://sangaline.com

[2] - https://intoli.com/blog/

Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#43

Post by quiqueqs »

We just started a blog a few months ago at our company on a variety of topics such as mobile & BE development, as well as design [1]. Hopefully it's of use to the community :)

I also enjoy the Hacker Noon articles [2]

[1] https://blog.picnic.nl/

[2] https://hackernoon.com/

Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#44

Post by JayeshSidhwani »

I had asked a similar question on Quora [1] few years back. Here is the summary:

- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Engineering?sk=notes

- Google: http://google-engtools.blogspot.com/

- Twitter: http://engineering.twitter.com/

- Linkedin: http://engineering.linkedin.com/blog

- Dropbox: https://tech.dropbox.com/

- Instagram: http://instagram-engineering.tumblr.com/

- Netflix: http://techblog.netflix.com/

- Flickr: http://code.flickr.com

- Etsy: http://codeascraft.etsy.com/

- Yelp: http://engineeringblog.yelp.com/

- Heroku: https://blog.heroku.com/

- Airbnb: http://nerds.airbnb.com/

- Bitly: http://word.bitly.com/

- Evernote: https://blog.evernote.com/tech/

- Highscalability: http://highscalability.com/

[1] https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-companies-that-have-some-...

Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#45

Post by sushanthiray »

quiqueqs wrote: post #43

We just started a blog a few months ago at our company on a variety of topics such as mobile & BE development, as well as design [1]. Hopefully it's of use to the community :) I also enjoy the Hacker Noon articles [2] [1] https://blog.picnic.nl/ [2] https://hackernoon.com/

*Hacker Noon

Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#46

Post by dfcowell »

foob wrote: post #41

What are peoples' thoughts on the marketing effectiveness of quality relative to quantity in blogging? We have recently started publishing what we consider to be very high quality material (the majority of them have front-paged on HN if that's any indication). Most of these have been published on [1] so far but we're in the process of transitioning to a more official company blog [2]. A close friend who really knows…

The answer to this depends entirely upon who you're trying to reach with your tech-blog-as-marketing approach. If it's primarily recruitment-oriented marketing, or you're marketing a tech product (apologies, I haven't checked the link - but it's not relevant for this general advice).

If it's recruitment-focused or you're a tech provider marketing to technical customers quality is probably more important. The intended audience is educated enough to spot and dismiss fluff outright and anyone that doesn't isn't a recruit or customer you want.

If your goal is marketing to non-technical people who buy your product a technical blog is probably irrelevant at best and potentially destructive at worst. If the customer is non-technical and doesn't understand the material you present publicly, they may be scared off. Fluff pieces that demonstrate knowledge with lots of buzzwords that appeal to middle-upper management will be more effective with this audience.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#47

Post by AznHisoka »

foob wrote: post #41

What are peoples' thoughts on the marketing effectiveness of quality relative to quantity in blogging? We have recently started publishing what we consider to be very high quality material (the majority of them have front-paged on HN if that's any indication). Most of these have been published on [1] so far but we're in the process of transitioning to a more official company blog [2]. A close friend who really knows…

Do both.

Put your really impactful content in your blog and your fluff pieces into its own section/knowledge base. (stuff people will probably search for but wont share). People who find your blog will just see the impactful stuff and will want to subscribe.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#49

Post by pryelluw »

foob wrote: post #41

What are peoples' thoughts on the marketing effectiveness of quality relative to quantity in blogging? We have recently started publishing what we consider to be very high quality material (the majority of them have front-paged on HN if that's any indication). Most of these have been published on [1] so far but we're in the process of transitioning to a more official company blog [2]. A close friend who really knows…

Who buys your product? Blog with them in mind. If you are not selling to engineers, fluff typically works best.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies have the best blogs written by their engineering team?

#50

Post by quiqueqs »

sushanthiray wrote: post #45
quiqueqs wrote: post #43

We just started a blog a few months ago at our company on a variety of topics such as mobile & BE development, as well as design [1]. Hopefully it's of use to the community :) I also enjoy the Hacker Noon articles [2] [1] https://blog.picnic.nl/ [2] https://hackernoon.com/

*Hacker Noon

Fixed, thanks!
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