Website Marketing Resource

Not long ago a blog was simply an online diary. Initially, people decided that blogging was describing, in excruciating detail, how their day went, what they had for dinner last night, and why they spent the whole weekend doing laundry.

Since then, blogging made the transition into the business arena. Now blogs are frequently being used as business journals, tools that can help keep your customers and web site visitors up to date with what is going on with your company. A business blog is an excellent tool to toot your own horn, let the world know about your new products, and tell your target customers why they should do business with you, rather than your competitor.

Don’t have a blog for your business yet? No problem! Here is how you can start blogging in just five easy steps:

* Set up a blog for your business. If you don’t want to have to set up things on your own, visit Blogger.com. Blogger will host your blog on its server, so that you don’t have to add anything to your own web site.

On the other hand, if you’d like to set something up on your own, get blogging software from WordPress.org

* Make your blog an extension of your business identity. The look and feel of your blog should match that of your business web site. Don’t forget to include your logo!

* Don’t make the blog into a giant ad. Your readers will immediately recognize that ruse and stop reading the blog. Instead, post the items that are of interest to your current and potential customers. Use the blog to post tips and ideas, articles, information about new products, etc.

* Strike a balance between personal and business stuff. While customers like to read the blog to learn about the person behind the business, don’t use the blog as a tool to vent, complain and discuss the details of your personal life. You use the blog to converse with your customers, so the blog should be as professional as your newsletter and phone conversations with customers.

It is great to post a story about how you helped a client get an important product out on time, and how proud that made you feel. It might not be appropriate to post a story about an argument you had with a video store clerk over the weekend.

* Leverage your Blog. When you are in business, you realize that many customers have similar questions/concerns. Address these concerns in your blog, and when another customer has the same concern, link directly to the blog entry that answers these concerns.

A blog is an excellent tool to reach potential customers, rank higher in search engines and generate more of the ever-important visitor traffic to your web site.

Biana Babinsky is the online business expert who has helped many business owners attract more web site customers, bring in more online publicity and increase the bottom line. Visit http://avocadoconsulting.com/free_newsletter.html to subscribe to her newsletter full of marketing tips and ideas and join her online business coaching program at http://www.MarketingSalad.com

Business blogs are primarily used to improve a company’s communication both internally and externally. Business blogs are a type of communication channel that could be used effectively in product launches, team interaction internally within the company or interaction between clients and company. With the level of interactivity blogs provide, clients feel more confident in the company. Not to mention the amount of traffic it brings to the main site.

Personal and business blogs: What is difference between two?

There is not much of difference between personal and business blogs visually but there is a fine difference between them in terms of reputation and brand attached.

Business blogs should be well planned before hand. Companies can’t afford to just walk away after launching their blog. Business blog has to be successful. Constant and consistent posts are the rule of the game. Blogsphere is full of best writers and faster one learns their rule, better for them. Companies can’t just rely on the fact that they are market leaders in their business so they will be successful with their blogs too.

The postings on business blog should be open and should portray personality of the writer and the company. The postings on business blogs should be very informal, and should be written in first person voice. Posts should be informative and relevant with an expert touch to it.

Business Blogs and it content:

According to search engine optimizers, “Content is King”. Indeed this is true for websites but not for a blog. Blog is all about writing with a particular voice and personality. A lot of people would like the style and would stick to the blog with regular visits. A lot of them will hate it and would never return.

Content for a business blog should be written in a strong voice with high consistency in quality. It becomes somewhat difficult to maintain quality with regular postings, but no choice. A few bad or substandard posts and regular visitors to the blog will fly off.

Important

Don’t hammer your visitors every time with posts like how great is your product and so on. Add some funny incidences or bit of humor to your postings. Talk something about how employees enjoyed drinks in a party organized at particular department. Add some lighter moments in between posts.

Amitabh Shukla
(Personal blog for the author is at http://seoexpertindia.tblog.com)