Many of my clients are starting to pay attention to blogs and wondering if perhaps they should be blogging themselves. My answer is always a resounding yes!
Running a business blog has many benefits. Here are just a few:
- Blogging is a great way to communicate with clients, customers and prospects. Whether it be talking about new products or services, company news or resolving an issue, you can communicate on a level not seen before.
- A blog give you a voice which in turn gives readers an idea of who you and your business are. Your goal is to then engage them enough to want to do business with you.
- Blogging can help position you as an expert in your industry.
- Blogs attracts links and can help you in your search engine rankings.
There you have it, just a few reasons why a blog can benefit your business. I’m sure there are many more so feel free to post yours in the comments.
I couldn’t agree more, Sophie. Marketing is about dialogue with customers and blogging is a great way to fuel that dialogue. If the posts are ones that invite and encourage your customers to comment so much the better. If there is the rare customer who is less than fully satisfied, winning that customer around can be an even more newsworthy event.
Hi Sophie,
I completely agree. The main issue we are running into with this is that our small business clients seem to be having problems finding the time to devote to blogging. When the owner of the business IS the business and he/she is already putting in a 10 hour day just trying to cover their regular tasks, it actually is a challenge for them to get going with this.
So far, we’ve set up blogs for 3 of our clients…and sadly, they just aren’t using them like we hoped they would. All three of these have been incorporated into their websites and are being prominently featured on the sites, and the folks just aren’t sitting down to do the work. We put in the time to create the blogs, and to teach the business folks how to use the blogs, how to write a link, how to make an image link, etc., but we’re feeling rather sad seeing the blogs just sit there, despite our attempts to thoroughly educate the owners about the blog and its great potentials.
This is a tough one. The potential is so great, but the owner of the blog has got to make time to use it.
Thanks for this post. I enjoyed it!
Miriam
Thanks both of you for your comments and my apologies for tardiness in replying.
Miriam, I hear you. Having a blog is one thing, writing in it regularly is another. One thing I encourage is for my clients to consider having employees write in it too. Not always possible when you’re a one man (or is that woman 😉 ) show.
Perhaps once they’ve written one or two they’ll get a feel for it. I know that’s what happened to me.