This site is organized in a tabbed structure – much like a series of file folders:

First Tab – BEST PRACTICE BLOG

The first tab is the blog articles written by Barry Deutsch, Brad Remillard, and our distinguished list of experts. These blog articles include original content with tips, suggestions, recommendations, and other ideas. It also features short reviews of other blog articles written by experts outside of Vistage, representing the elite bloggers with expertise in particular subject areas. The blog articles we pick are considered to be outstanding best practices, most of which we have personally implemented and tested.

Second Tab – HIRE AND RETAIN

This tab includes the feed from the popular IMPACT Hiring Solutions Hire and Retain Blog, blog feeds from other Vistage Community Members with an expertise in hiring, personality profiling, compensation, retention, rewards, success-based management, culture, and employee engagement.

Third Tab – LEADERSHIP

As in the previous tab, we’ll feature both Vistage Bloggers with an expertise on leadership, including chairs, members, speakers, and trusted advisors. We’ll also feature the best content in blogging for leadership and management – especially those aimed at the entrepreneurial-middle market size companies. We’ll review some of these articles in our Best Practice Blog Tab.

Fourth Tab – MANAGING SALES

In this tab, we’ll feature those bloggers with an expertise in areas of sales, marketing, personal branding, networking, and using social media as an effective selling, lead generation, and relationship tool. If you’re a Vistage Company, and have not jumped into the pool with social media and networking – especially for your sales team – you’re missing a tremendous opportunity to leverage your best people and their effectiveness.

In this tab, we will feature the blogs written specifically about networking and obtaining referrals and business leads, both on-line and off-line. We also have included some of the blogs specifically focused on LinkedIn since this is the acknowledged go-to site for professional networking. We’ll be discussing with high frequency the use of LinkedIn as a core strategy in building relationships with potential clients/customers.

We’ll identify those blogs that are focused on how to create a powerful personal brand. Creating awareness and differentiation is critical for your long term success. It’s much easier to have people “FIND YOU” vs. “FINDING CLIENTS/CUSTOMERS”. We’ve picked the very best bloggers and experts on how to develop and sustain a powerful personal brand.

Fifth Tab – SOCIAL MEDIA

In this tab,we feature the blogs written about the various social media sites and the tools and applications for managing your social media and networking interactions. We’ll highlight and review in the Best Practice Blog Tab some of the tools we use and consider to be valuable as you expand your social media and networking activities. review all the social media and social networking tools that you might find useful in managing your communication, branding, social networking connections. These might include tools like the MS Outlook Extension Xobni, Plaxo, Gist, Google Analytics, Snag-it, Google Wave, Google Buzz, Google Reader, Firefox Extensions, and many others.

In this tab, we’ve also brought together some of the best bloggers and experts on marketing on-line, using drip nurturing techniques to build relationships over time, connecting with potential people directly in the “market” for your services. Much of the material is generic. In addition, we identify some of the blogs aimed at some of the more popular social media “marketing” sites, like Facebook – specifically creating Facebook Fan Pages separate from your personal Facebook account.

Without a question, blogging is one of the most effective marketing vehicles for any business. It should be at the top of the pyramid for all your “marketing” and “branding efforts”. Yes – it takes a tremendous amount of time to blog consistently (doesn’t do any good if you’re doing it inconsistently). Yes – it is a long-term strategy. You’re probably NOT going to see an effective leverage from blogging until you’ve probably written over 100 blog postings. However, even though it takes a tremendous effort to write your own blog, it is, and will continue for years to be, the most effective method to distribute your message, branding, marketing.

We feature blogging tips, techniques, advice from the A-list of bloggers. We also feature a few blogs with the behind-the-scenes technical elements of building and developing a blog – especially using the most popular blogging platform of WordPress.

Sixth Tab – VISTAGE BLOGGERS

We’ll highlight those Vistage Community Bloggers that have a strong voice in the blogging community and in their area of expertise. Just at the launch of our Portal, we already have over 20 Vistage Community Bloggers that encompass a wide range of expertise, international scope, and cut across chairs, members, speakers, and trusted advisors.

Our primary requirement for having your blog featured here is that you blog regularly – at least once per week and that you offer excellent value back to the Vistage Community.

We will ask some of the Vistage Bloggers that provide exceptionally strong value back to the Vistage Community – and whose value, tools, tips, techniques, and advice can be used by chairs, members, speakers, and trusted advisors. You can read more about these highly respected experts on our Guest Bloggers Page.

If you would like to have your blog featured here on the Vistage Leadership Community Portal, please use our contact form or send me an email directly so that we can review your blog.

Use this “portal” for the Vistage Leadership Community as your home base for some of the very best content and best practices on hiring and retaining your best people, leadership, culture, employee engagement, marketing, sales management, branding, networking, and leveraging social media.

We see this site as a complement to the Vistage Library and Knowledge Center, not a replacement. Since the content is focused on subject matter experts who blog, we pull together the most current and dynamic thoughts, ideas, tips, techniques, and strategies.

If you have an idea or suggestion of blogger you think we should be highlighting, or an idea for an additional content area of primary concern across the entire Vistage Community, please let us know.

Barry Deutsch