Not long ago I had a series of conversations with some people who wanted to start a business blog.

Their company website, designed in-house, is fine, as are their print materials. They present their products and all the information a potential buyer needs to make a decision. But because their marketing — while slick and informative and exactly what the boss wants — is in no way conversational, it's no longer enough.

The CEO runs a tight ship. He isn’t a bad guy, not at all. The company is doing reasonably well, and he’s not ready for what may turn out to be just a fad, especially when the price is a fairly substantial loss of control over how his company is presented to the public. If it all went terribly wrong, there are several hundred people whose jobs might be in jeopardy.

The sales and marketing people I’ve been talking to don’t need to be persuaded about conversational marketing; they already understand the advantages of a blog. But they think that it’s unlikely that the boss will permit blogging anytime soon, because to him the problems seem to outweigh any possible advantages.