Blogs, are they a useful marketing tool?

[Steve-H]

Having heard the word "blog" mentioned several times I have been looking into this to see it has any commercial benefit from a marketing point of view. I guess it may do for some businesses but I am struggling to see how I could apply this technology to my own business.

If I understand correctly a blog is effectively an online diary that you update as and when. I can see this being useful for businesses that receive repeat custom or provide ongoing services but does it have a use for a business where the customer very rarely comes back? The service we sell is usually only needed once in most peoples lifetime.

I do not want to miss the boat on this one but as I understand it blogging is more for personal use than business.

Now tell me, have I missed the point or should I do some more research?

[Brian Turner]

A blog can be used to:

- position yourself as an industry commentator worth paying attention to
- for recommending key products and services, either via a little direct marketing, or else through general reputation
- for increasing visibility in search engines, by having a well-linked to website


I guess the way to think about it is to equate a blog as like a weekly newspaper column. You start out writing for the "Goole Morning Herald Advertiser" - but if you stick at it long enough and push the issue hard enough, one day you may wake up to find you have the online equivalent of a column in the "Independent".

In the same way as an established newspaper columnist can have influence in the non-virtual world, an established blogger can establish some influence on the internet.

Public visibility can also help create a sense of trust and personability - if you are in the public eye, you are publicly accountable - and, heck, some people may even decide that they find your comments interesting.

A couple of the blogs here are still low-key, but developing:

http://www.platinax.co.uk/blogs/roytroxel/

Roy is obviously setting himself up as an IT commentator. As this place grows in size and influence, so will his voice carry with this site.

A big part of sales and marketing is simply having a presence - as Oscar Wilde once said, "the only thing worse than being talked about, is not being talk about". A blog is a way of putting yourself in the conversation.

For business online, I'd say it represents real opportunities and potential that can be used in different ways.

Do you think you could give yourself a voice in your industry?

[Steve-H]

Thanks for the informative reply Brian, that makes Blogging much clearer.

So where do poeple go to Blog? Do you build the function into your own site or can you register with sites of interest and start blogging. How do you get your own blog?

Originally Posted by Brian Turner

Do you think you could give yourself a voice in your industry?

I don't see why not, we are one of the most established companies in our industry and have a lot of exprience and expertise at our disposal. My only concern would be the time commitment.

[Brian Turner]

Well, I'm experimenting with blogs on Platinax - you can see a starter list here:
http://www.platinax.co.uk/blogs/

If you would like to experiment with using a blog for business commentary, then I'd be happy to set you up with one and get your started. How does that sound?

[Steve-H]

Ok Brian, I'll give it ago. Thanks.

Let me know the next step.

[Craig B]

I keep meaning to give it a go but never get round to it.

Might be the push I need to have a shot at it...

Craig

[Brian Turner]

Once I have my home office set back up, I should be able to offer something here...

[aberbotimue]

I don't use a blog in my business for clients to see, but I have found they help in the google possitioning.

I have a load of google alerts in an rss feed to my journal, so I can see who is moving in the top searches that I am interested in.. I started seeing my journal, in those top searches, as they talk about those links, sort of circular!!

so now I commebt in my journal, to the google results, and my sites have moved up a few places...

Connected?? I duno...

But even if they arn't google is changing cos of my blog...

[RSSwatch]

This may help with your decision about using a blog.

I've been following rss almost exclusively for the past 6
months and testing it on numerous indexed url's for its
syndicated effectiveness.

I have also been testing various blog uses on 6 url's and have
found that a blog (competitive keywords and market) WILL
dramatically imporve index placement on 9 of the top ten
SE's. Linking a blog to the indexed url also improves that url's
index performance.

In most cases, the syndicated blog placed on the first indexed
page for competitive keywords WITHOUT "traditional" links, and
ahead of well established url's.

Some of the keywords (and keyword phrases) in the multi-million
competitive keyword category actually outperform very well
established web sites when using a blog.

The indexed url (non-syndicated) moves up behind the blog
and improved index placement occurs after approximately
50 blog posts and continues to climb with better syndication
(if indexed url is linked to blog).

Once syndication of the blog hits around 100 this stabilizes the indexed
placement of the url and it does not move up and down, as many
do on indexed pages of the top 9 SE's. This is when you can begin
improved SEO for the url and see even better positioning.

As an example you can check this effectiveness by doing a search
for "rss email autoresponder" on yahoo.

If you check the "link status" of this blog (and the indexed url)
you will find it has no
"traditional" links, yet is in the #1 indexed position for yahoo
and its sister sites occupy 6 of the top 10 indexed positions.

The exception is the url rss-email.net

This url has no "traditional" links either and the blog for this url
is indexed "after" the indexed url.

This has happened on one other url and I have no explanation
for it, other than syndication has exceeded 200 for the associated
blog.

Practically all of its keywords allow it to show up across the
board for in the top 9 SE's, except GOOGLE.

This could be because it is a new url (5 months old) and also
because Google does not recognize the significance of RSS - yet.

None of the other urls tested show a trend for google to
give any priority to anything rss, although google is beta testing
an rss ad-sense.

In short, you WILL see a difference in your indexed url if you
decide to link a blog to it.

You can also syndicate the indexed url, but this requires frequent
updates (at least every 3 days), and for some, this is not practicle.

Hope this helps.

To your success!

Lars

[netspanjon]

If you get a chance, visit clickz. It's a marketing site where provide articles about marketing strategies. This site has been extremely helpful to me in the past. They have an extremely good article about blogs being used into today's marketing strategies. Iwould have foound the exact link to that article, but I'm what they call.... lazy.