The business offshoot of the extremely popular BlogHer conference kicks off today in New York and we want to take this opportunity to highlight a Voce client who is taking part in the show and sharing her experiences in what it takes to get a corporate blog off the ground the right way. Nicki Dugan is the creator, editor, and chief Yahoo! blogger for the company’s corporate blog, Yodel Anecdotal.

Nicki took an idea, turned it into reality, and started Yodel as “Yet another self-serving corporate blog” in August 2006, but this wasn’t intended to be an ordinary company mouthpiece. Nicki set out to create a blog that would serve as both an outlet for the company to communicate with a variety of its stakeholders and as a voice that would put personality to corporate behavior. From the blog’s very first post, which included a great behind-scenes video of Yahoo! corporate culture, it has continued to blossom into a hub of diverse information about the company that now includes posts on emerging trends, behind-the-scenes commentary, employee profiles, user stories, guest opinions, more and more video, podcasts, photos and, well, you get the point.

Based on Nicki’s success as a blogger, editor, and innovative leader, the BlogHer conference hand-picked her for one of its coveted speaking slots and Nicki jumped at the chance. Who wouldn’t want to go to New York for a few days and hang out with other leading female bloggers? We’re jealous, Nicki!

As part of the panel “How to Embrace the Social Media Culture,” Nicki will strut her stuff with some other leading ladies from the blogosphere and mainstream media realms, including FastCompany.com editor Lynne D. Johnson and Weblogs, Inc. editor Karen Walrond, with Maria Niles moderating the discussion. Together they will address some of the nagging questions companies and organizations face when developing a blog and accompanying strategy, including things like who should blog for a company? How do you enact “authenticity” and how much “I” is “TMI”?

The panel will take place during the Workshop #2 portion of the conference on Day Two in the 1:30pm – 2:45pm timeframe.

So, if you’re planning on attending, or know for sure you’ll be there, cruise by on day two for some insights from some powerful women leading the blogging revolution both inside and outside companies. And tell Nicki we sent you.

/Ryan Lack

Technorati Tags: yahoo, nicki+dugan, yodel+anecdotal, blogher

This week I attended the Tech Policy Summit in San Jose.

The summit was a gathering of prominent leaders from the private and public sectors, examining policy issues affecting technology innovation and adoption in Silicon Valley and beyond. Congressman Howard Berman, Sun Microsystems CEO Jonathan Schwartz and the Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg all participated in various sessions.

From a communicator’s perspective it was a learning experience, I’m not regularly exposed to tech policy work in my day-to-day job. However, despite being new to the discussion, it was clear that little of what was being discussed was ground-breaking stuff, and many were left wishing the speakers and panelist had gone just a little deeper into tech policy debates, particularly in the areas of patents, the relationship of security and privacy, and strategies in broadband delivery. Unfortunately, the closest thing to a debate (that I saw) was when Walt Mossberg leaned on AT&T’s James Cicconi to answer why AT&T and other wireless phone service providers continued to limit choices in hardware devices and software on their networks.

Another highlight was Walt Mossberg’s discussion with Jonathan Schwartz about green tech and energy conservation. Clearly a lot of companies are latching on to green tech, but Sun is one of the few companies that can actually provided some practical examples. I also thought it was interesting to hear that Google’s highest expense after people is energy which is why it’s looking to locate its datacenters near naturally cost-efficient hydro-electric plants.

I’m glad I could attend, I learned some good stuff, surface stuff I know, but it was helpful nonetheless.

Check out the Tech Summit Blog for more insights and detail.

/Ben Hohmann

Technorati Tags: tech+policy+summit, green+tech, business, silicon valley, technology