Start Blogging Now: 10 Reasons Why You Really Need a Blog for Your Business

1. It is perfect for creating a web presence for independent professionals who have something to say and who need people to get to know them and what they can do for them.

2. Having your own business blog gives you credibility and a forum where you can show your expertise.

3. Readers can comment directly onto your blog, creating interaction and interest.

4. No more waiting for your web designer to update your web site.

5. You can post to your blog yourself, about any issue, daily if you wish, and get it broadcast into the blogosphere instantly.

6. The search engines love blogs and will pick up your keywords easily, boosting your rankings, making it easier for people to find you on the web.

7. Customers are drawn to personality behind the business. Human voices convey intimacy beyond PR-babble. (To read about this topic read The Cluetrain Manifesto. The first chapter is available free online: http://cluetrain.com/apocalypso.html.)

8. You can network and build up a community of like-minded readers. You blog, people comment. Others blog, you comment. Before you know it, more people have heard of you and your business because the buzz gets passed around.

9. You can test out new ideas and get instant feedback. Get your customers and prospects in on the act now and let them help you help them - invite them to talk back! Let them see how you develop your products and services and they can show you how to best to serve them.

10. You can use your blog side-bars to promote your products, your affiliate products, run blog ads, sell books, and any other product or services you have. You don't have to include this in the body or content of your article; therefore your posts - your writing - can remain content rich and free of promotional hype.

Finally, email marketing and electronic newsletters are struggling because of over-crowded inboxes, spam problems and filters.

- On the average, 64.7% of the business e-mail you send is not even opened, let alone read. [source: Q3 2004 Email Trend Report, DoubleClick ]

- E-mail marketers are seeing their open-rates range from only "mid-20s to just over 50 %" [source: ClickZ.com]

- That means that you are losing at least 50% of your prospective buyers or readers. How much does that amount to in losses over the course of the next few years?

- AOL receives roughly 2 billion e-mail messages a day, of which about 75 percent are blocked and another 4 to 7 percent are sent to the bulk folder. [source: ClickZ.com]

Sit up and pay attention. The time to start blogging for your business is now.

Denise Wakeman of Next Level Partnership, and Patsi Krakoff of Customized Newsletter Services, have teamed up to create blogging classes and marketing services for independent professionals. You can read and subscribe to their blog at http://www.buildabetterblog.com

More Resources

Unable to open RSS Feed $XMLfilename with error HTTP ERROR: 404, exiting

More Blogging/RSS Information:

Related Articles

What Is RSS?
Recently I did an interview with a well known email Internet Marketer. He wanted to share with his readers a viewpoint on what RSS is from someone who is using it in place of traditional email marketing.
How to Make Money with Your Blog
-- What Is A BlogA blog (or web log as what originally called) is the modern day equivalent of a journal?think 'captains log stardate?' and you're heading in the right direction.A blog is an online publication about a subject or subjects that interest you.
RSS is a Life Raft, Saving Us from a Sea of Useless Information
One of the main problems with the Internet these days is the fact that there is so much information out there; it can be quite hard to find the particular knowledge that you're looking for. It can often feel like you're surfing waves of thick chocolate fudge sauce and your honeycomb board has a crack that's getting wider by the second.
Why Your Blog Might Be Sabotaging Your Business
Many marketers were very excited when forum and newsletter discussion focused first on blogs (about two years ago) and then on RSS feeds (mainly within the past year). It was a brand new opportunity for marketers to use, one that promised both search engine success and a way around spam complaints.
RSS Latest News - Blogging or Blagging?
The RSS latest news suggests that RSS can stand for 'Really Simple Syndication', 'Rich Site Summary' or probably other interpretations of the acronym. An RSS tool is one that can deliver the technology where it is required.
#1 Mistake Most Blogs Do
As much as this might surprise most bloggers, the #1 mistake most blogs are doing is not publishing their content via e-mail, as a supplement to their RSS feeds.Just think about it: while RSS is growing strong, it still only penetrates about 5-6% of the American online population.
Podcasting vs. Blogging
The US Navy blogs. Larry Kudlow of CNBC blogs.
Learn how to Create a RSS Feed
Creating an RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed is really quite a simple process. RSS is a lightweight XML design that is really easy to setup and implement.
RSS - The Intelligent Marketing Medium
Are you new to RSS? If so here is a introduction to what RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is and how your website will benefit from offering an RSS feed to your visitor's.RSS is a smooth channel of communication between publishers and visitor's.
What Blog Can Make Money?
How to blog to make money from it?Truly the whole picture of making money blogging is simple:you blog (B), traffic comes to your blog (T), you PREsell to them (P) and finally monetize (M).You may ask me "I have blog and peoples are coming.
Bloggin for a Reason
For some it's just a fun thing to do, while some others feel they will soon be left out; they soon join the crowd. Everyone who uses the internet knows someone who has a blog.
It Really Is Simple RSS
I have 'Googlebot' coming to my site every day since a month ago I put up my first news feed, since then I have put up yet another.I never used to see 'Googlebot' much before, so it goes to show that if you want to be noticed by the search engines, you need to put up a 'news-feed'.
Blogs And Your Work From Home Internet Business
As a work from home internet business entrepreneur you have several really good tools on the internet you can take advantage of in order to build your work from home business. A blog is just one of those tools that you can use and should be taking advantage of.
Why Would You Use Blogs Instead of a Web Site For Your Online Business?
Why would you use Blogs instead of a web site for your online business?What's wrong with using a web site for conducting your online business? How can Blogs help and why should I need one anyway?Combining a website and a Blog however offer a number of superior advantages in terms of traffic generation, marketing and efficiency which a stand-alone website cannot do.(a) Automatic push-button publishing.
Blogging Your Way To Success Part 1
It has been said that blogging will be the new trend in the 21st century. It is easy to see why.
Should You Get A Blog?
A blog is a type of website. It allows the website owner to easily write messages that get posted to the site automatically, often in a journal or diary-like style.
What are Blogs and How Do You Profit from Them?
'Blogs' or 'Blogging' have existed for several years and there are still many people who don't know what one is and how important it is to making you money.A blog is a web log.
Using RSS Feeds to Set Off a Traffic Explosion
RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, is the perfect answer to your needs for sharing and distributing content. The way this works is webmasters can share bits of code with one another that give them access to the others forums, newsletters, blogs, information, news, and the like.
RSS Meets the Needs of Direct Marketers
Contrary to general opinion, RSS meets the needs of even the most demanding direct marketer, actually providing most of what e-mail marketing does, except for the strong push factor.Most direct marketing reasons against RSS are in fact the result of inadequate understanding of RSS by most marketers.
Blogs and RSS - Why Do I Need This Stuff?
If you've been under a rock for the last year or so it'spossible you might not have heard about blogs and RSS feeds.If you're like most of us, you've heard the buzz but mightnot've known what to make of it or what to do with it.