Instead of providing a dry list of the top ways you can use blogs, I’ve decided to look at blogging in a different way. I have taken the top seven types of business blogs and personified them as different characters, or locations, within a city. Let’s take a tour of this virtual city and visit some people and places your business may want to work with as it discovers, experiments with, and eventually embraces blogging:

• The Barber Barbers can prove to be prominent citizens— they know the right people, have lots of wisdom from years of listening to customers, and have no problem sharing that wisdom. In some ways, a barber serves as a pundit or analyst, or perhaps an adviser. The barber deserves to be heard not only because she sees things differently, but often because she’s right.

• The Blacksmith The blacksmith is like the barber in that he knows the industry, except he is typically inside a company and is thus hammering industry and opinion through the company forge. Software developers at IBM, Sun, and other large technology companies fulfill this role as they bring their experience to bear on a problem.

• The Bridge A bridge blogger is a person who makes connections, influences, and helps bring people together. She is obsessed with relationships and connecting people, and as a result she can often function as a peacekeeper. In a corporate setting, the public relations professional may be a natural bridge blogger—or it could just as easily be the company secretary.

• The Window A window blogger is similar to a blacksmith blogger in that he typically works inside a company and uses his experience to frame his opinions. The difference between the two types, though, is that a blacksmith blogger typically talks about things inside the company, while a window blogger typically talks about things inside and outside the company.

• The Signpost A signpost blogger in unusual in that she typically doesn’t share her opinions—at least that isn’t the primary reason for her blog’s existence. A signpost blogger points out cool things of interest in her industry. She may not have much to say in each post (maybe only a few words describing a topic of interest), but she may post dozens of short notes per day as she comes across interesting tidbits, perhaps pointing readers to information at other sites.

• The Pub Pub bloggers create discussions designed to bring in people from all spectrums of a particular issue to talk something through and have a laugh at themselves or others in the process. Peter Davidson’s blog is a solid pub blog example; “Thinking by Peter Davidson” (http://peterthink .blogs.com/thinking, allows a group of likeminded thinkers to explore a variety of issues.

• The Newspaper A newspaper blogger functions in many ways like a journalist—attempting to do more reporting than opining, she does her best to stick to the facts. Many political blogs are newspaper-ish in nature, as are a few technical blogs, such as Engadget (www.engadget.com), which focuses on the latest “gadgety” news.

A single blog may often include characteristics of several of these types; however, because blogs are generally written by one blogger or a small group of bloggers, you can often see an overriding trend as to what type of blogger is at work. Mixed in with these broad areas are other types of blogs that make up the blogospherical town—the post office, where people go for a large variety of information; the town hall, where important decisions are made; and all sorts of other oddities. A healthy town needs all types of citizens and places, and there are certainly more than enough uses for blogs to go around.

Some unique mixtures of blog types include Dave Pollard’s “How to Save the World” (http://blogs.salon.com/0002007), which is much like a coffee shop for likeminded people to gather and discuss topics; the “New Communications Blogzine” (www.newcommblogzine .com), which provides monthly insights from marketing and communications leaders; and “Doc Searls Weblog” (http://doc.weblogs.com), where Doc not only shares his opinions, but frames them with dozens of other opinions from the blogosphere.