Entries Tagged as 'Business blogs'

Why, Why, Why Blog? Reason 2

Blogs are great tools to engage your customer. And an engaged customer builds a vested interest in your product.

A bookstore, for example, is an excellent candidate for a blog. Bookstores sell to customers’ passions — passions for literature, learning, politics. And we all love connecting over our passions. Give us a blog that tells us about the next book-signing, has a bit about the author, has a blog posting BY the author. Add in an RSS feed so we’re alerted to new events at the store. Have a section where we can comment on bestsellers. Have a section for the book club that meets there once a month.

Do all that, and you’re steps closer to engaging your customers, to creating that old-time feeling of the general store as a gathering place and of the storekeeper as a friend and confidante. And that goes for whether you are selling a product or a service.

Blogs can create that cozy, general store feeling. As we get to know you, the owner, manager, blogger, we become invested, engaged. We care.

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, Online Content, Small business blogging by Judith
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Why, Why, Why Blog?

We’re circling  back to that one essential question for small businesses: Why bother to Blog?

Here’s the short answer: marketing.

And that’s what I mean when I say we’re circling back to the essential question for small business blogging. Blogging is marketing. That’s what intrigued me from the beginning and what lured me into the blogosphere. In my travels around town I’m still getting that same question from business consultants, entrepreneurs, and recently a bookstore owner. Why, why, why blog? So, I’m circling back to dig deeper. Beyond marketing.

I promised I’d be experimenting with blogging, seeing how it went for me and my Web content and editorial business and sharing business possibilities with you.

Well, here’s how it’s going: It’s changed my way of thinking; it’s put me in touch with great marketing minds (see “Blogs on Marketing” on my blogroll); it’s expanded my thinking about PR, social media, and the impact of sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube. It’s connected me into Web 2.0, niche marketing on the Web, the importance of content, thought leadership, transparency and open communication.

And I’m lovin’ it.

I love the relationship aspect; I love all the good stuff, the connections and sharing. And, ok. I am still entirely UNinterested in the rants, the diaries and celebrity chat. But I can live with all that, just as I live with the noisy neighbors who hang out by their cars and smoke — because I spend time instead with my fascinating Zen neighbor who grows the most beautiful garden in town.

I spend my time on the blogs that feed me, intrigue me and add to my life.

We live in a world of chaotic proportions. That’s reflected on the Web. It’s anarchic, enormous, and growing exponentially. Blogs help people find us and us find people.

Blogs help customers find us, connect with us, get to know us — and that relationship is essential to marketing in today’s world.

There’s more to the long answer to why blog? And why use it to market? But blogs are supposed to be short, so I’ll be back in a couple of days with a second great reason for small business blogging. And a third. And a fourth.

Yours, Judith

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, Marketing Blogs, Small Business, Small business blogging by Judith
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Blog a Lot?

Here’s a topic that does not go away. How much should I —  must I –  blog? Last month, in response to a blog by Debbie Weil, corporate blogger, I said, maybe not so much.

Maybe that’s not the full answer, though. Nick Stamoulis, blogger, author, at Brick Marketing, weighs in this week with his thoughts. A must-read! So, surf over there and check it out. My blog  on the topic is still live, and you’ll want to see the comments there, too. Chris McElroy picked up on the resurfacing of the conversation and his 2 cents is for more, not less, blogging, as he says in the comments to my blog.

So, do I have the definitive answer for you on how often to do your small business blogging? We need to keep exploring the topic. And maybe, just maybe, the answer is individual as well as SEO-related: as in, what’s YOUR goal for your blog?

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, Marketing Blogs, SEO, Small business blogging by Judith
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Building a blog not to blog

Can you use a blog site without ever blogging? Using it as a Website instead? I’ve been asked this question by potential clients who do not want to blog but want to be able to make their own changes to their small business brochure sites. The answer is yes. Absolutely. You can use the software and it is mighty easy to use. That’s one of its greatest assets and what’s made it so ubiquitous in so many professions and fields of business.

Blog software, though, is not the only answer for small businesses. Other content management software might better serve a small business site. And some of it is free, too, just as the popular blog software is. So, if you’re thinking about building a quick blog to replace a static site, we may have a better answer for you. 

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, Functionality, Small Business by Judith
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99 Good Reasons to Read a Blog

The subhead here could be Great stuff on blogs! There’s a compilation on a blog, b5media, of great blogs recently posted on the “best” worst practices in businesses – those that will kill your business. They call it 99 Ways to Kill Your Business, and I picked up a link to it from Rachel Clarke’s Behind the Buzz blog.

My point? Lots of people still have the idea that blogs are diaries. I don’t remember how many times people have said just that to me, as in: Why would I read a blog? I don’t care what some so-and-so had for breakfast.

So here, next time the question comes up: 99 good reasons to read a blog.

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, Online Content by Judith
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On Linked In and Linking to blogs

I was at a local meeting of the American Marketing Association (AMA) at lunch and was reminded of all of the links that bloggers create. The speaker, from LeverageSoftware.com, a company that sells online community software, talked about all of her Facebook, MyPlace, and blog connections.

I haven’t personally done a lot of Facebook or MyPlace, but I do have a LinkedIn account, and I was reminded that I had not visited it for some time. Been neglecting it. So I dropped in and I invited a few friends and colleagues to link to me (and me to them). That linking is a valuable part of this whole new Live Web. It plays into the blogging we’re doing. It’s the exciting part where I plug into your thoughts and you plug into mine. It’s that virtual clink, that LinkLinkLink we hear in the blogosphere.

Linking and connecting is the heartbeat of blogging for business.

Ultimately, the idea is to get way way beyond just shooting SEO keywords back and forth to optimize sites; ultimately, Live Web is about connecting and listening to each other’s comments.

Is that listening happening a lot? That’s something I’d like to know, something that will either make blogging a big part of my life and business, or not. IMHO, the jury’s still out on that one, but I’m rooting for success.

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, SEO, Small Business by Judith
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Best and Worst: What’s YOUR opinion?

Great discussion going on the last couple of days on The Best and Worst Business Books. The list, posted by BNet, points to the 10 most overrated and 10 most underrated business books. I’ve read about half of the books, and I pretty much agree with the lists. I can’t help wondering why The Tipping Point is on the underrated list, though, since “tipping point” has entered the language mainstream as a result of the book. But I’m right with them on the Who Moved My Cheese book — who needs to read a whole book to get that point?

That aside, here’s an interesting exercise for anyone considering starting a business blog: check out David Meerman Scott’s blog and the comments that logged in under his posting. Then check out the Websites of the commenters. And you’ll catch just a glimmer of how a blog convo moves through the sphere.

Go ahead and jump in on the conversation, too. Here’s where your opinion as a business owner counts the most. Those books are aimed at us entrepreneurs, so go ahead and log in your thoughts.

And, ok, a few more opinions from me on those books: Next on my list is The Long Tail for more on niche marketing and then Nickel and Dimed, been meaning to read it since it came out. But I doubt if I’ll read the finance book for Dummies. Boy, am I ever sick of that series!

 

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, Small Business by Judith
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Gotta blog a lot? Maybe not.

Just when I’m convinced that the gurus are right — you’ve gotta blog every day if you want your voice to be heard in the blogosphere — one of the top business bloggers breaks the rules.

Debbie Weil, who wrote the book on corporate blogging (The Corporate Blogging Book), is blogging less. Why, you may ask, would a leading blogger and marketing expert cut back on blogging?

Life and its hometown joys interrupted, it seems.

One comment to her blog interested me especially –From David Koopman questioning if we need to blog everyday. Search engines reward you if you do, but just between us, maybe that indiscriminate blogging is what got bloggers their rep amongst non-bloggers as narcissistic diarists blogging about what they had for breakfast.

It’s something to think about as you set up your business blog calendar.

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, SEO, Small business blogging by Judith
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Blogging 101: the Basics

Judith photoBack to square one: what is a blog, anyway? 

A friend, who remains anonymous –  but you know who you are! — mentioned that she needed remedial blog training. She was laughing, but seriously so. Jumping into this fast-moving river can scare even the warrior women amongst us away.

So, I googled and surfed a bit and found a solid, fundamental explanation of blogging.

Here ya go: it’s Darrell Zahorsky’s section on Small businesses in about.com. Look to the side of the article, “What a Blog Can Do for Your Small Business,” for a link to the “Anatomy of a blog.” Good info there. Also, scroll down the main page for his samples of well-done business blogs.

And THAT is one of the wonders of the Internet and the blog community: sharing this wealth of knowledge so we can all get a running start before we jump into that river. 

Tags: Blogging, Business blogs, Small Business by Judith
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Step Away from SEO

Though the power of positioning may be in search engine optimization, the value resides in content. 

I haven’t optimized the Harlan blog yet. (That’s on purpose: I want to tackle the aspects of the blog one-by-one so we can all learn together.) But as I look further into small business blogs, I’m picking up more and more on search engine optimization. SEO has become a specialization in the field of Web development. It takes someone who has made a study of search engine algorithms and is hooked into info on any changes to them. It’s a detail-driven specialization.

Average SEO will get your name coming up on searches. Great SEO will get your name coming up high on the first page of a search. In my mind, great SEO is akin to buying the inside cover of a magazine versus letting the ad fall wherever it may. It’s worth the extra money and effort.

That said, I know I need to step away from the technical side of blog marketing for a bit. It’s easy for me, because I like a puzzle, to get drawn into the tech pieces, to add tag clouds and play with RSS feeds.

But it’s time to get back to what makes a blog valuable and popular. And that’s content.

Content is queen of Web 2.0. If you want clients and customers to come back to your site,

give them great content.

Free advice: Valuable content doesn’t just tell folks everything there is to know about your product. It gives them info, statistics, insight and links to the world around your product. For instance, if you sell organic shampoo, valuable content might include info about what goes into the major brands of non-organic shampoo and what those unpronounceable chemicals are. You might link to environmental sites with info on chemicals in the water system. In other words, follow the concerns of the organic shampoo customer, and provide rich content that they care about.

Become a source of info that people will pass on to others in their social group.    

Tags: Business blogs, Free Advice, SEO by Judith
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