I think this is an interesting approach and will be curious to follow it. The thing that bothers me is this statement on ListPipe's site:

"ListPipe provides Powerful Custom Content™ for Beehive Credit Union. We post a new customized blog article each week that includes research on keywords, and high value links to important pages on their home site."

It smacks of SEO gaming and goes against the intention of creating a local voice. A blog isn't about keywords and high-value links. A blog is about engaging in conversation and providing an outlet for both employees and members to share in a conversation.

I agree with Tim. Although the customized blogging template gives the appearance of a blog, I think Beehive misses the point of blogging. It appears that they're using a Web 2.0 structure for what is essentially a static Web 1.0 site. It's focus seems to be marketing products in the same way as a traditional web site as opposed to encouraging and engaging in dialogue with members.

Great point, Tim. Speaking of SEO, since each of these "microsites" is a 99% replica of each other, the other concern I would have is related to duplicate content. Search engines like original content and if one site is the same as another (as is the case here), the effect can actually result in a negative impact on your search rankings.

While ListPipe's strategy may work well for single-instance sites by providing fresh blog articles on a regular basis, it will be interesting to see if this is as effective in this instance given the fact that these articles are showing up on multiple sites under different URLs.

Searching Google's Webmaster Help Center for "duplicate content + seo" yields quite a bit of information on this issue, so others that decide to follow this strategy may want to tread carefully.

Not to be a total "wet blanket", on the plus side, I think it's great that the blogging platform is being brought main-stream. I also like the contribution and interaction between the organization and customer (or member, as is the case with CUs). With Gen X/Y customers not visiting traditional branch offices as much as their parents, this type of "Web 2.0" strategy is one that may eventually be required to build a relationship with these types of customers/members.

However it shakes out, this is something that I'm very interested in watching evolve. I know many financial institutions are concerned about compliance, privacy and other related issues.

Using a blogging platform is a great way to build out a website. Our main website is based on a heavily customized version of wordpress, and basically does not look like a blog until you click on blog, but it all comes from a blogging platform.

One comment though, when I go to login to their online banking, there are 2 browser logos saying whet they support....

- internet explorer

- netscape

Netscape??? what a flashback. That needs to be freshened up with Safari, Firefox, and ditch the netscape.

Another comment on "what a blog is for".

I agree blogs are best used as way as a way to engage people in a conversation. But ...

I don't see the word blog on these sites anywhere. They are not really publishing a traditional blog. It's really just a customized site with fresh articles that happens to be built on top of wordpress. And wordpress is generically just a CMS (content management system) that happens to excel at blogging.

Also, they don't let you comment on articles (not posts), but you can click on a link asking you to login to post a comment. It takes you to the generic WP login screen. This link should probably be removed since it looks like commenting is not allowed.

I have been following your comments and find them very interesting. Thank you.

I want to comment on a couple items that have been brought up in this thread:

The blogs are designed to help each of the localized branches appear in localized searches. We are publishing 'fresh' content with localized terms so that people searching for services will find them where they need them, in their local area.

This is not intended to be an 'SEO game'. We publish honest content with an honest intention: to help customers who are searching for specific services find them in their respective geography. For this reason we have created custom Contact Us pages for each site. We are against spam, and only publish meaningful information with a geographic emphasis.

As for duplicate content; we understand this well. Our service works to avoid duplicate content penalties with a number of copywriting techniques that focus on uniqueness, as everyone should.

Each of the Beehive blogs are manageable by each individual branch. As they learn to, and become comfortable with blogging, I expect that each of the branches will begin to post their own local content.

Allowing comments is tricky for any commercial enterprise. There is a fine line between 'encouraging open dialogue' and monitoring what people are saying about your commercial products. I favor open dialogue, but understand a corporate need to moderate and censor information that would be damaging to a corporate objective (sales). Along with this comes a tremendous burden of moderation. I recommend that our corporate clients disallow comments unless they are ready to hire a moderator. Corporate objectives are very different than organizational objectives, where dialogue is part of the draw, and regulations are more relaxed.

I look forward to hearing more comments, and appreciate any feedback.

-Cary Snowden, ListPipe