Blogging For Business: Tips on Marketing With Your Blog
There are so many different types of blogs, and some of them are for a variety of uses besides marketing for your business. Even my first blog, started in 2005 while I was still a classroom teacher, was not for business in any way. I had started a Blogger site on Google’s Blogspot platform in order to better serve my students with information and technology.
On May 2, 2005 Business Week magazine published a cover story entitled ‘Blog Will Change Your Business’ and the world took notice. While I was not even aware of that story until much later, I know that my simple little blog had a huge impact in the way I communicated with my students, other teachers, and parents.
When it comes to blogging for your business, think of this as opening the doors to awareness and participation. Awareness of who you are, what you’re doing, who you serve, and what you know about your niche topic. Participation in the form of involvement, maintaining a conversation with your readers, and encouraging feedback with comments and guest posts. At no other time in our history have businesses enjoyed such a rich culture of instant interaction and masterminding on a site accessible by people around the world. And instead of your prospects and clients talking amongst themselves, they have the opportunity to talk directly with you, and you with them in a manner that encourages openness and an exchange of ideas leading to improved products, services, and customer relations.
The blogospehere ( a term coined to refer collectively to all blogs and their interactions) has become a vast field of thoughts, dreams, and ideas, yet most blogs are abandoned soon after being set up. With an estimated two hundred million blogs online during 2013, that’s a lot of lonely electrons out there in cyberspace. I have to admit that a dozen or so of that number were mine; forgotten when I changed my mind about writing on a certain topic.
Once you get into the habit of blogging a couple of time each week you will find your voice and understand the true value of blogging for business. I run a seven figure business from my blogs and many other entrepreneurs do the same.
So when it comes to blogging for your business, tips for marketing include creating fresh and relevant content to drive targeted traffic, adding an optin box with a free giveaway to build your list, and inviting comments to increase visibility and credibility. Your blog is your ‘home on the Internet’, so make it a warm and inviting place to receive readers, prospects, and clients.
