FOT/HRCapitalist v5.0 Talent Management Blog Power Rankings - Our Top 30 Blogs!

Everyone loves a contest. Including us. And you know? We're a competitive bunch here at Fistful of Talent. So with that... I present our last talent management blog ranking of 2009. (Okay, so you'll scroll past the next three paragraphs and then go straight to the rankings. We know how you guys are!)

For this round of blog rankings, we decided to go a different route. We decided to take our personal opinions out of the voting equation - because you get enough of that here on this blog every single. day. - and let an independent third party tell us who reigns supreme in our space. You heard us. We're letting someone else decide, someone completely objective since there have been whispers in the past with questions about our methodology. Then there were questions about fairness when we opened up the voting to you guys via March Madness. Let's face it. It's hard to be anything except first place, so we understand the frustrations from bloggers who don't make our top 25. But people! Let me just remind you that this is only the FOT's little 'ole blog ranking process. This is not the Emmys. This is not like nominating and winning the Nobel Peace Prize. No acceptance speeches are made here, that is unless you're Jim Stroud. 

In all seriousness though, with this ranking we decided to use HubSpot Website Grader's tool to tell us who is the best of the best. According to HubSpot, their grading tool gives a score, with 100% the maximum possible score. They evaluate "marketing effectiveness" which is based on a proprietary algorithm that blends over 50 different variables including search engine data, traffic, backlinks, etc.  Now we realize, this takes out of the equation the human factor, the FOT factor. But this is pretty black and white, wouldn't you say? And since traffic is a factor in the website grading... let's hope trust that good content is what drives great blogs with high traffic. 

As always, we hope you'll learn about some new blogs to read in this process... and we give total props to our fellow bloggers for being such great inspirations for us to continue with our blogging. We're happy to be in such great company. So with that? The top 30, their website grade and previous rankings if applicable. Over 160 blogs were graded and these came out as the cream of the crop according to HubSpot! Oh, and we added in FOT + the HR Capitalist for fun, just to see how we stack up (and damn it feels good to be in the top ten!). (And the fine print - we removed Cheezhead since no active blog posts have been produced since its acquisition by Jobing. We also removed Ning or comparable community social networks that host multiple blogs like ERE and RecruitingBlogs. Love ya guys, but we know you understand.) 

1.    Personal Branding Blog  99.8 HubSpot score| 13th Place, (07/2009 Rankings)

2.    HR Capitalist 99.7  HubSpot score  |  ineligible

3.    All Things Workplace 99.5  HubSpot score  |  10th Place

4.    Punk Rock HR 99.3  HubSpot score  |  6th Place

5.    HR Bartender 99.2  HubSpot score  |  3rd Place

6.    Tom Peters! 99.0  HubSpot score  |  unranked

7.    Compensation Force 98.9  HubSpot score  |  4th Place

8.    Fistful of Talent 98.8  HubSpot score  |  ineligible

       Recruiter Guy 98.8  HubSpot score  |  9th Place

10.   Know HR 98.6  HubSpot score  |  15th Place

       Marketing Headhunter 98.6  HubSpot score  |  unranked

       Your HR Guy/Rehaul 98.6  HubSpot score  |  2nd Place

13.   Effortless HR 98.5  HubSpot score  |  unranked

14.   Jibber Jobber 98.2  HubSpot score  |  unranked

            Systematic HR 98.2  HubSpot score  |  unranked

16.  Simply Lisa (HR Thoughts) 98.1  HubSpot score  |  15th Place

17.  Workplace Prof Blog 98  HubSpot score  |  unranked

       Oracle Talented Apps 98  HubSpot score  |  unranked

19.  Taleo Talent Management 97.8  HubSpot score  |  unranked

       My Global Career 97.8  HubSpot score  |  unranked

21.  HR Lori 97.7  HubSpot score  |  unranked

22.  Sylvia Ann Hewlett 97.6  HubSpot score  |  unranked

23.  Renegade HR 97.6  HubSpot score  |  7th Place

24.  The Recruiters Lounge 97.5  HubSpot score  |  19th Place

        Sirona Says 97.5  HubSpot score  |  unranked

26.  Great Leadership 97.1  HubSpot score  |  22nd Place

27.  Compensation Cafe 97  HubSpot score  |  unranked

28.  Employee Factor 96.8 HubSpot score  |  unranked

29.  Michael Specht 96.6  HubSpot score  |  unranked

30.  Workers Comp Insider  96.5  HubSpot score  |  unranked

Interesting results, yeah? And if you don't think these are the top 30 talent management blogs? Well folks, this is like American Idol. Just call me Simon as I just judge to help narrow it down from the general masses... but after that? It's up to you and your votes/links... only with the blogosphere, your votes and links are your mouse clicks which equate to traffic. Cheers to such great talent and amazing smarts in the talent management blogosphere... and until next time. Look for our next ranking in January 2010. 

Comments

[Sharlyn Lauby]

Thank you Jessica and the entire FOT team. HR Bartender is absolutely thrilled to be on the list!

[Ann Bares]

Thanks Jessica and team for your continued efforts to track the great stuff happening in the talent management blogosphere. Both Compensation Force and the Compensation Cafe appreciate the recognition alongside such a terrific group of blogs!

[Lisa Rosendahl]

Thank you Jessica and Fistful of Talent for your work, acknowledging the HR Community and for including Simply Lisa. Such a great community we have going here!

[www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=632019852]

Thanks, guys. Very nice.

[Frank Roche]

Thank you. Fun, as always, to be on the list.

[Pete Radloff]

not surprised to see many of the blogs on there. All top quality. Great content and great job by Dan Schwabel - kudos on the top spot.

[Steve Roesler]

Hey, Jessica, thank you and the FOT gang. You all have bumped up the HR online game since Day 1...keep rockin'!

[Andy Headworth]

Wow what a list of great blogs!

Big thanks to you, Jessica and Fistful of Talent peeps. I am really pleased Sirona Says made it into your list again.

[Jim Edwards]

Great guys!

[Meg Bear]

Thanks so much Jessica et. al. We are so honored to be participating with this group.

[Michael Haberman, SPHR]

Well disappointed with my absence, but given what they say about how bad blogspot is I guess I am not surprised. Hmmmm.. what to do now?

[Dan McCarthy]

Jessica -
I love the FOT list and am proud to wear the badge! Thanks to you and the team for keeping it alive.

[Lisa Rosendahl]

Thanks Jessica and the FOT team for rallying the HR space. Proud to be included on the list and will wear the badge with pride!

[GL HOFFMAN]

Nice list and congrats to all who made the list.

GL Hoffman
http://blogs.jobdig.com/wwds
(what would dad say)

[Rodelio Lagahit]

great list and congrats to all who made it.. now i don't have to dig for really informative blogs because of this list.

[Raymond Stantz]

This is an excellent list. Where do you think Cheezhead would have been if they had continued to post some content since the Jobing acquisition? Does anyone have any idea if they have lost all the traffic that Joel cultivated over the years? It kinda seems like a waste to me to let such a hot website just fade away. I guess the acquisition was just thrown together at the last minute with no real plan since they clearly did not have any future planned for the site. Seems like another failure to execute on Jobing’s part and par for the course. You would think that Joel could have started blogging on Jobing’s hosted blogs and redirected his traffic there, but who are we to question two of the smartest guys in the room?

[Dan Schawbel]

Thank you for the honor

[RecruiterGuy]

I'm late to coming into the comments but wanted to say thanks for being included again and that I'm excited to again see such a great list of bloggers pushed out by FoT. Great stuff, gang. Keep it up!

Chris Hoyt
aka: RecruiterGuy
www.RecruiterGuy.net
@TheRecruiterGuy

[Talent Management]

Great list and excellent resource! This will keep us busy. Good post and many thanks!