Blogging as a Marketing Tool
There are definitely two sides to blogging! Some experts would have you believe that you can just create a blog in a matter of a few seconds, and that after that the hard work is over - you just have to sit back and enjoy the benefits. WRONG!
First of all, blogging CAN be a highly effective marketing tool. Second of all, it is HARD WORK. No matter how you do it!
The process runs something like this:
Find your platform. Figure out which blogging tools you intend to use - you can use a service, or you can use software on your own web host. Each has an advantage, each has a disadvantage, and there is no such thing as a perfect solution. For ease of use, services win out. For flexibility, usually your own hosted software will be superior.
Learn to use it. You have to learn the lingo, and you have to learn the functions and how best to use them. No choice. You can learn to be a blogging guru, or you can learn just enough to make it work, but you WILL have to learn!
You can either set up automatic posts that periodically post to your blog, or you can log in and post when you choose. EITHER WAY, you STILL have to write the material, or find something to post that you have a legal right to post. You can expect this to take a significant amount of time each week.
You will have to maintain a regular schedule of posting once you start. If you do not do that, then no one will bother to come by, because you won't be reliable.
You have to watch the comments, and monitor activity on your blog. If you fail to do THAT, then your blog will be taken over by spammers, and any marketing advantage that it gave you will evaporate.
You have to market the blog! So it gives you one more thing to market. Now, at first, blogs were easier to market than a regular website, due to high popularity, and new marketing venues that were easier to get into than website listings. HOWEVER... some of those venues are getting harder to effectively break into, and it is only a matter of time before any advantage to a blog will be buried in the masses of competition out there. That is just the nature of the web.
You have to use it to market your site in an effective manner. Just HAVING one, and listing it, and posting in it is not enough! You have to provide consistent, and high quality information that people WANT. Without that, you have nothing more than a waste of your time, and a waste of everyone else's time.
If you want it to be picked up and syndicated, you have to learn how to manage the functions that control that feature. And you have to keep up with the demands that it places on you.
Ok, to be very frank, I have chosen not to blog. I could do it, I have the writing skills, and an endless flow of ideas, but I do not work very well on a schedule that has to be observed daily or weekly. I just lose steam over time. So for me, blogging is not a good fit as a marketing method. For others, it is a great one though, so make your choice based on YOUR needs, and YOUR strengths, and not on some line of hype someone is feeding you to get you to buy their book on how to do it!
You don't HAVE to blog to have a successful business. Having one will not guarantee you any kind of success. Done right, they can be a powerful tool to communicate with your potential customers, and to help the pagerank of your site.
Written by Laura Wheeler
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