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Business Blog Step 20 - Companies Which Would Benefit from Having a Blog

Guest post by: Gary Baker

Article Overview: It seems to me that, while most businesses could benefit from using a Blog as part of their marketing and business development activities, there are some types of companies which would find them particularly beneficial.

Business Blog Step 20 - Companies Which Would Benefit from Having a Blog

It seems to me that, while most businesses could benefit from using a Blog as part of their marketing and business development activities, there are some types of companies which would find them particularly beneficial.

Companies which need to present a human face to their activities:

Some professional services organisations have been known to suffer from a bland image. Using a blog, you can break down some of these preconceptions and reveal some of the personalities carrying out the work which will help to engender greater trust in what is a customer focused environment.

Companies which rely on their specialist knowledge to attract clients:

Consistently demonstrating expertise in a chosen field can quickly help to build a positive reputation and encourage potential clients to gravitate towards you.

Client case studies go part of the way, but displaying both your general and specialised knowledge over a period of time in a blog helps more than a sanitised case study can ever do. Think of it as multiple case studies on steroids if you like. This is particularly relevant for independent consultants and specialist consultancies.

Companies which have progressed beyond the “hard sell” approach:

Direct advertising and the hard sell has become less and less successful as an approach. However, an educational marketing approach, where you provide potential clients with information on which to make their own informed decision on their purchase, has gone from strength to strength.

Companies wanting to become more of a partner than a supplier:

As you engage potential clients through your blog, you develop trust and a relationship which can position you as a partner rather than a simple supplier. People prefer to work with and buy from people and companies that they trust and a blog will help to achieve this.

Companies wishing to be THE information resource for their market niche:

Most of the information that your prospective clients are looking for is available on the web, it is just a case of finding it. So rather than let potential clients find it on a competitor’s site, provide it yourself or provide links to it on your Blog.

You will become the preferred place to go for this type of information and so attract anyone interested in your niche to your blog. This in turn provides you with the ideal opportunity to open a dialogue with them.

Companies organising conferences, seminars and exhibitions:

Blogs are the ideal focal point for collating and distributing information to attendees pre-conference and for gathering feedback from them during and after the event. You can update the conference details and add new information yourself, and you automatically develop a powerful online search engine marketing tool as well.

Companies looking to develop a network or community around themselves:

As a networking tool, a blog can help in many different ways but one of its most powerful is when it allows the creation of a network of like minded people interested in a particular area. It is particularly positive for the company setting this up and running it because they find themselves at the centre of this network and therefore in a high profile position.

Companies developing new products or services: customer feedback and input is essential in the product development process. By taking the step to allow this feedback to take place on a Blog, you are allowing discussions and generating ideas which can be invaluable to the process. Added to this, you have a group of people who have contributed to the product and so are likely to be its strongest evangelists and advocates.

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Article Tags: blog, blogging, blogging for beginners, business blogs, companies, wordpress, wordpresscom, wordpressorg



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Re: Best Internet Marketing Strategy - Hi David, I agree about the Blogosphere. You have a smaller group that Blog, but do so on the premise that they think they should, but have never really considered the purpose of their Blog. Then I think there are a few SEO or Internet Marketing types that see Blogging as just another link building strategy. But the largest group of Bloggers, tend to be people who enjoy writing and discussing their topics of interest. Blogging is good for link building, but the true Blogger is a breed apart from the rest. They want to dialog, to debate, to have feedback and they are very willing to link to other worthwhile conversations that are relevant to their topic. I agree with you. These group of Bloggers obviously are passionate about their writing and together, they create huge conversation trails interactive and travel from Blog to Blog. But the evidence is clear with this group that loves what they write about. With comments enabled on a Blog and having a Blog tuned to a specific purpose you already have the evidence of original Social Media.
Re: Alexa Ranking Goals - That's great GT! What method did you use to put up the Entrepreneur Blog Network in your Wordpress Blog? We're always looking for the easiest methods to help bloggers who are not techies get involved.
EvanCarmichael.com suggestion - Maybe I missed it but I would like to suggest that a Blog be created to support the Forum. The idea is that in the blog you put in snippets of some of the biggest conversations with a 'read more' link to the forum itself. Setting up the Blog and clipping some conversations onto it wouldn't take very long.
Jen's Blog - Spam protection - Jen, I like the Blog and just posted a comment to one of your articles. From my experience you need to implement some sort of SPAM capture tools. i use them on my Blog and it's been a life saver as I'm getting hit by spam atleast 5 times a day. I use Wordpress and they have plugins like Captcha and SPAM Karma installed.
Blog Marketing Anyone? - Hi Kevin I suppose you could use the same SEO principles on a Blog as you can for a website but the more content you have within your Blog, the better rankings/traffic you would receive. Would you have time to write a full length article with tips in it every day or second day to get the article count rolling over every week? I would also like to know if anyone has had any experiences with marketing blogs and the traffic they received.


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