10 Blogs We Couldn’t Do Without

Blogging may supposedly be on the decline, but there’s a lot of quality out there – and none more so than in the field of internet marketing.

Joe Pulizzi, author of the recommended Get Content. Get Customers. has put together a handy list of 42 blogs that are regularly churning out some inspirational writing. I’m completely unfamiliar with some of them, but they’ll be bookmarked on both laptop and iPhone before long.

And while we’re at it, I thought I’d present a list of 10 blogs which we here at Social Magnet couldn’t do without. They are:

• Web Ink Now: If you had to come up with a single thought-leader in this niche, it would be David Meerman Scott. His New Rules of Marketing and PR is a convincing encapsulation of the paradigm shift in marketing that Web 2.0 has enabled. His latest, World Wide Rave, is packed with great case studies to prove the theory and his blog is consistently thought-provoking.
• PR 2.0: Brian Solis is an adopter on the prehistoric side of early. Generally seems to know about stuff years ahead of others. Also recommended is his recent Putting the Public Back in Public Relations book.
• Andrew McAfee: A former Harvard Business School lecturer, now at MIT, McAfee brings an academic’s rigour to his musings on ‘Enterprise 2.0′, the term he coined to describe the changing face of business in a web 2.0 world.

• Avinash Kaushik: Author of Web Analytics: An Hour a Day and an authority on the whole area of web analytics. Contagiously passionate about his subject.
• Lifehacker: “Tips and downloads for getting things done” reads the strapline, but Lifehacker is much more than that. Covers just about every area of life you can think of – a quick look today reveals everything from a Firefox 3.6 preview to an article entitled “Make Your Own Toxin-Free Insect Repellent with a Splash of Vodka”.
• Sphinn: Highly useful one-stop for internet marketers.
• Steve Rubel: Consistently interesting read from someone at the sharp end of emerging technologies.
• Chris Brogan: Prolific blogger, tweeter and all-round social media star. Can be simply too prolific – a bit skimmable sometimes – but he still manages to produce an incredible level of original and thought-provoking content.
• Google Webmaster Blog: An essential read to ensure we stay with the programme.
• Peter Kim: Not actually Peter’s blog – it’s his social media marketing examples wiki that we find ourselves going back to time and time again whenever the well of inspiration dries up.