Posts Tagged ‘blogging’

Bloggers are influential. A study reports that 50% of those who report reading blogs, trust them for their evaluations of products. And of those using blogs to evaluate products, 52% of respondents said that blogs tipped their decision on which product to purchase at the time of their purchase.

Over the last few years, I’ve had clients respond with strong a “no” when we’ve suggested that they have a blog. Most have concerns that they won’t be able to keep up the posts and most don’t want the exposure to negative comments that they believe the company will receive. Others worry about the expense of delegating someone to respond. With good management, authenticity and transparency in posts and responses to comments, many of these objections can be overcome.

The positive points of having a blog for your business are capably enumerated in this post from Conversation Agent. Especially insightful are these points:

Blogs allow you to:

• provide topical and relevant information and resources regularly, to become an appointment
• receive feedback from your readers and engage them in discussions that are relevant to them
• distribute your content more widely thanks to Google and the larger business community online

Valeria Maltoni’s helpful suggestions of how to organize one’s thoughts and ideas work.

As she notes, printed and mailed newsletters have their place as do e-newsletters, but a blog allows for two way conversation. As we’ve noted in previous posts (Ask your users what they think), we want to listen and engage more than talk to.

Blogging is a rewarding way to engage your customers and provides immediate and updated news to them.

Recently I was working on a publicity campaign for the launch of a new business. The plans for publicity called for the new business to share information with conventional media and bloggers.

Someone asked me, “Are bloggers important?” My reply, “Yes.” Sharing your news directly with those who start conversation is the best way to reach targeted persuaders.

Many old school types can’t see the power of blogging, they don’t read blogs or use them as a forum and there is not a really good way, yet, to measure the power of a blog. (If you know of one, do tell me!) Oldies know blogs exist, but it’s like the feelings that advertisers had ten years ago about the Hispanic and Latino market, “why bother?” And now that the other shoe has dropped on that market, we clearly understand the importance of the Hispanic and Latino markets.

Here’s why bother, about blogs that is. Bloggers and their readers are conversationalists who are sharing, posting, inquiring and recommending on a daily basis. Not only that, they are Twittering, FaceBooking, and, yes, even MySpacing to their contacts. Not only are bloggers opinions real, they are searchable.

Google is caching pages with your company’s name, your products and your press releases.

This isn’t just my opinion, but is the reality of the merged world of marketing and PR.

I’ve been reading, How the Web Has Changed the Rules of Marketing and PR by David Meerman Scott and I am especially impressed with his statement about the change.

“With blogs, we communicate directly with our audience, bypassing the media filter completely. We have the power to create our own media branding the niche of our own choosing. It’s about being found on Google and Yahoo! and vertical sites and RSS feeds.”

So, if you have not started a blog, not read a blog, or don’t have one on your company site, today’s the day.