I believe that building influence online is the future of architectural practice.

Fast forward to a not distant date; it may be that some buildings are designed and engineered digitally, “built” before the ground is even broken – all in view of a watching public. When construction begins, its process is monitored, explained and documented – also for public consumption. The hidden dramas of architecture are revealed to an untapped audience.

This is the nuptial promise of networked BIM technology and decentralized media advertising.

Still near-future: a potential client watchs an episode of Mad Men and then dial up Frank Gehry’s premium content (or that of any architect who has packaged his ongoing story via text and image). Stories of creation and teamwork, hardship and failure, make for great drama. The one providing these stories will influence the public audience and enhance the state of the profession. This is marketing writ large.

I’ll say it again. Building influence online is the future of architectural practice.

Now, back to the present:

• What can an underemployed architect do now to reach this future where what he or she has been trained to do is understood and valued?
• What can a struggling firm do now to cultivate viewers, followers, subscribers – “pre-clients” awaiting the new economy?
• What can strapped professional associations do now to raise the perceptual tide that buoys all the boats?

What can be done now to build influence online? Launch and maintain a professional blog!

That’s what Building Content is about. Coaching and encouraging architects to tell their unique story with a professional blog; to begin to build influence online.  Come back as I roll out the revised “Building Content”  – we can build architectural influence together.

In the few months since I launched this blog (dedicated to encouraging and equipping fellow architects to start their own professional blogs) I have seen several developments that are worth noting. If launching your own blog seems daunting, you may find solace in numbers. Here are three blog communities you could affiliate with or just visit to see what other professionals are producing.

The industry-specific networking site, UPworld, which is built around the global Real Estate, Design and Construction fields began its blog feature last year. Selected UPworld members agree to provide one publish-ready post per month. The site administrator regulates the posts so there is a fresh flow of new content for member-readers.  UPworld is free but it has moved to ”by invitation only” enrollment; please let me know if you’d like to check it out and I’ll email you the link. My series of blogs explores netgiving, a term I use for enlightened online interaction beyond mere networking.  

There is a new industry-based blogging venture that I just encountered through one of my LinkedIn groups. It was initiated by a young Engineering Marketer named Curtis Lewis. The site is called AecPress and serves ”interior designers, architects and builders (who see) the benefits of engaging in social media” and seek an audience of peers for their blogs. This audience aligns with my target niche, so I’m right in there with Curtis. Membership is open, so please take a look at AecPress.

I have one final example of industry-directed blogging - and along with it a humble request. Mark Buckshon at Construction Marketing Ideas has established one of the finest construction blog networks. To showcase the quantity and quality of the blogs, he has established the Best Construction Blog competition. Follow this link to the official ballot; from the titles alone you can see the array of specialty niches within the construction industry. There really are some fine examples of professional blogs that you can peruse for information and blogging inspiration. Why not vote for one or two? (I’ll tuck my request in here: While you’ve got the ballot open, please vote for my blog, “Building Content“. It is seventh on the list. Soliciting votes like this is okay, it’s actually approved by the concert rules. Thanks!)

I invite you to access these different blogging communities. If you have any specific questions, please let me know. And as always, feel free to leave your comments here.

Learning from Las Vegas - Cover Art

Learning from Las Vegas is the title of Robert Venturi and Denise Scott-Brown’s seminal work. In the early seventies, Venturi, Scott Brown and their associates heralded a profound shift in the understanding of buildings; not unlike the current shift in our understanding of media and communication embodied by the Blogworld Expo 2009 in Nevada.

Again, fellow architects, we are Learning from Las Vegas.  

In this second example of great advice from the Blogworld Expo, I present a gem from Irene Koehler, the social media coach at Almost Savvy. She tracked down the inimitable Chris Brogan who granted this brief interview answering the question, “How can having a blog help me or my business? ” (view video)

Now, for those of you who aren’t yet immersed in the new media, this interview with Chris Brogan is equivalent to meeting a young Robert Venturi while his theory and design were changing the way the profession thought about buildings. (If you don’t understand this reference, ask an elder architect about the Vanna Venturi House.)

Seriously, as an architectural practitioner wandering around the edges of blog production, watch this video and see if Chris Brogan’s sage advice nudges you forward. Our culture is undergoing a profound communication shift, and with it, the means of business promotion is transforming too.  It is a unique time. Learn from it and begin reaching your future clients by means of your own professional blog.

Please post your comments here. If you have specific questions, feel free to contact me (or Irene or Chris for that matter) and start moving forward on your professional blog.

From time to time I have the opportunity to contribute to the blog at UPworld, a unique online community for designers, builders and real estate professionals. As UPworld grew they chose to move to an invitation only model. Recently when tweeting a reference to a blog I’d posted there, a friend pointed out the simple truth – without access to the site she couldn’t get to my post. I’ve come up with a fix, in the form of this offer:

If any of my readers here at Building Content would like to join this global network of industry specialists, please contact me. I would be pleased to have you join and become part of my UPworld network. We can move from the traditional writer-audience relationship to a more dynamic paradigm within an industry-specific community.

Please leave a comment or email me at collier1960@hotmail.com.

It’s been interesting to monitor Twitter as some of the big names I’ve been following Tweet about the awesome presentation they are attending, or about the mentor they ran into, or the peers they finally got to enjoy dinner with. I picture typical convention interactions – except everyone is in their slippers and bathrobe.

Do I wish I was there? Sure. Not Vegas particularly, but the Expo itself, yes – meeting and exchanging with the field’s leaders and shapers. There have been many annual AIA, CSI, and ULI conventions that I’d hoped to attend but didn’t. However, I believe the difference between those conferences and Blogworld Expo 2009 is the nature of the industries they represent. The former are established groups, founded on bricks and mortar, essentially seeking to adapt to the changing world. The field of blogging is, by its nature, actually leading some of the change.  

Blogging appeared as, and will always be, a cottage industry. It consists of independent thinkers (yes, sometimes clothed in robe and slippers) presenting their ideas and building consensus through a de-centralized media. The centralized, conglomerated media that grew alongside the AIA and other construction industry associations late in the industrial age is giving way to the New Media.

Professional blogging is our media, global in reach, but focused in audience. The established industries, especially those based in the physical realm of construction, will adapt to the New or they will become marginalized. We, as architect-bloggers, can lead in thought and in consensus building, helping to shape the change in our field – and to profit from its adaptation.

As Architects we can readily name the leaders in our field; the starchitects, the prestigious partnerships, or the notable young upstarts. Most of us will never compete head-to-head with these folks; we weren’t meant too. As professor and author Michael J. Lewis writes in The New Criterion, the term “starchitect” was coined to describe the “ungainly fusion of architecture and celebrity.” Such celebrity, Lewis suggests, is not the authentic nature of architectural practice today, but a rather media-driven derivation of it. I agree. Furthermore, I believe that whatever traditional media, marketing and public relations can derive for a select set of architects, the New Media can do for the rest of us – in a more economical, ecological and democratic manner.

Any accomplished architect or established firm – especially in this economy – is in some way, at some level, a leader. Perhaps not a known commodity or a household word, but an authentic presence to be acknowledged nevertheless. Each of us has a combination of experience, knowledge and insight that merits an audience, even if we aren’t regularly featured in the professional press. As the traditional ways of promotion are passing away, the New Media is leveling the publicity field. Access is global – yet focused – publication is now freely available. The Internet is vast and the blogosphere has room for all of our stars.

Take inventory of what you have learned, experienced and accomplished in the field. Isn’t there an audience, a specific niche or group, that could benefit from knowing you? Couldn’t you be someone’s problem solver, idea broker or concept deliverer? Please think on this and consider launching your own professional blog. Become one of the bright and guiding lights in the Internet’s growing sphere of influence.