Business, economic development - the unofficial Chamber of Commerce

A modern job search campaign is by nature very Byzantine. While the web has offered a variety of new channels, it also creates increased competition for choice jobs and possible challenges for job hunters.

Job search needs to be thought of as a personal, extremely aimed marketing operation where you are the product. Your resume is an advertisement. Your extended network of colleagues is your inside source for information and job leads.

So where does the web fit in? At AA-Careers, we recently posted a job on a popular job board and got 600 plus applications in a calendar week. For one position. That’s increased competition for job openings.

Had a strong person contacted us before we posted the ad, they could have landed the position prior to running in to all that competition. How? By knowing an employee at our office who became aware of the job prior to posting. Everyone knew about of the job for at least 10 days before it was posted. Who in your network might know of a job that’s coming available soon?

Be careful how you submit your application as well. When we did an analysis of the 650 resumes, we found a large number of errors. 63% of the applicants were easily eliminated with a fast triage process. How? The same way any employer would. By passing over resumes where the objective didn’t match our job. By passing over candidates whose cover letters gave us reasons not to hire them, like "I know I’m overqualified but I really need a job". By eliminating job hunters whose documents that didn’t open properly. And by eliminating job hunters who didn’t bother to spell check their cover letter and/or resume.

So the good news is that job sites give you a sense of who is hiring, and for what kinds of positions. But once those positions are posted, the competition is intense. You can still try, if you have a well written resume, designed to appeal directly and clearly to the recruiter. And if you have practiced interviewing – so you don’t stumble at a critical point.

Another thing to be aware of is how quickly you can be checked out on the net. As we Googled several candidates, we ran into some pictures and comments that were in questionable taste. Nothing illegal, but enough to rock our thinking about who to hire.

AA-Careers provides a comprehensive set of services for Bay Area job seekers, providing our clients a personal career consultant, a managed job hunting campaign, modern tools like a personal website, video, highly targeted resume, and much more. Let us know if we can help you.

Be careful out there, and good hunting!

Larry Page, co-founder and President of Products of Google Inc., reveals in an interview with Andy Serwer, managing editor of Fortune Magazine, that he isn’t all about business and intensifying Google’s search engines; he cares a lot about making progress on things like renewable energy, safer cars, even mechanized farming. This is just one of the few things revealed about the reticent icon, in his interview last May 2008.

How he proposes change is not wholly through the latest technologies. Instead, he inculcates a certain way of thinking that people should look at things with a definitive approach. People should accept that failing is just a part of life. Risks are present in every venture. In the interview, Larry Page insists that too few people are willing to take risks; they like to stay in their comfort zones. Often, the people with the most insane ideas are the ones who’ve succeeded, he shares.

Page may have been referring to a lot of things when he discussed how risk takers leap into absolute darkness with nothing to light their way but faith. True, most people would not take risks because of the fear of failure. It is human nature that dictates fear, but it is also human nature to want to succeed.

Page here is not a philanthropist speaking but rather a philosopher, conveying his belief that life could be so much better if people start taking risks if they ever want to succeed. Page took a huge leap of faith when they started Google. Where he stands now is proof that he has stared down fear and followed his belief.

Larry Page is profiled on Forbes.

Technology leaders such as Mayo Shattuck are profiled on Leaders of Technology.

Mayo Shattuck is profiled on BusinessWeek.

I monitor a lot of blogs, forums and news sites with my trusty RSS reader. One of my favorite sites is SitePoint, which is a terrific discussion forum for webmasters, programmers and domain name investors.

I’ve had some great conversations on the forums and via IM that have been very enlightening.

In a recent post, one of the SitePoint forum guys was lamenting the fact that he was having trouble getting to 100 unique visitors per day.

There was some good, solid advice that I would like to share and build upon:

1. Make sure your posts are optimized with popular keywords. I would be careful with this one because you don’t want to lose your blogging voice or make your pages read awkwardly by jamming in as many keywords as you can. Do check for the most popular keywords in your universe, though, using a tool like WordTracker. As a poster on SitePoint said, using the competition values in WordTracker allows you to pick keywords that haven’t soaked the web yet.

2. Use a service like PinGoat to ping blogger indexing sites every time you change your site. Pinging is basically extending an invitation to indexing services like Technorati, IceRocket and Feedster to come to your site and index it. The more indexing you get, the more exposure you get. PinGoat is a terrific service that pings them all at the same time.

3. Update your Google Sitemap every few posts and resubmit it. A Google Sitemap is an interesting and amazing phenomenon. Here is how Google explains it:

The Google Sitemaps program is two-way communication between webmasters and Google. You can give us information about your site so we can index it more effectively, and we can show you how we see your site and tell you about any trouble we’ve had crawling it.

Basically you create a special xml file and tell Google to go look at it. It uses the file to better index the site. And it definitely works. There’s even a Plugin for WordPress that will build the perfect sitemap for Google. You can read more about sitemaps by visiting the Google Sitemaps page.

4. Post relevant comments on blogs related to your content area. Look around, find people blogging about the same stuff as you. Monitor their blog sites and participate in the discussion. Be sure to include a link to your site in all of your comments. It’s a great way to correspond with like-minded people and get your name and site name out there.

5. Search for link partners and link exchanges at least once a week. If you find a site you like, include it on your link page and drop the site owner an email. He or she will most likely list your site as well. Join a couple of free or cheap link exchange sites and stick to your subject area when exchanging links. Always visit the prospective link exchange site and ask yourself if you would be doing your readers a service by sending them to that site. If not, don’t link to the site.

6. Write great content, and don’t plug stuff unless you are familiar with it and approve of it. If you write interesting content about subjects that interest people they will always find you. Don’t hustle your readers if you are going to plug something for money, make sure the product or service is something you would use and recommend. If people sense a hustle they will not convert and they will not come back.

7. Watch your keywords and make sure they are performing. DigitalPoint has a terrific tool that will help you track your keyword placement over time so you can see how your efforts are doing.

8. Perform some basic Search Engine Optimization. Learn how to not only optimize your posts, but optimize your entire site. You can get some great tips and tools at SeoChat.com

9. Shake loose a couple of bucks and buy some ad space. Once you’re certain your blog looks and operates perfectly, spend $100 on Adsense ads and see how that helps.

10. Be patient. It isn’t going to happen overnight. It will take weeks or months to get things rolling.

100 uniques a day is attainable. Get Blogging!

Matt DeAngelis runs AffiliateBlog.com. Matt is the former CTO of Modem Media, a pioneer in the Internet ad space. As a foot soldier in the Internet revolution, Matt devised the technology behind many of the most successful ad campaigns of the time.

AffiliateBlog is his latest venture, and was started as a resource to help site owners and bloggers get more revenue from their sites.

From some years back weblogs (or simply “blogs”) have become one of the most popular ways of online publishing and communication. While still most of them have no commercial purpose, blogs as a makerting tool (or even as a business by itself) are increasing its presence on the Internet.

WHAT ARE BLOGS?

Though there are different approaches to weblogs, they can be defined as web sites where users post entries (news, articles…), updated frequently and normally reflecting the thoughts of the blog’s creator. Those entries (posts) are typically listed in reverse chronological order (the most recent entry on the top).

Most blogs allow visitors to leave their own comments on the diverse entries or even references from other blogs (trackbacks). This communication between different blogs and bloggers is one of the main factors involved in the fast growth of the so-called “blogosphere” (the whole community of blogs) and its current influence.

HOW A BLOG CAN HELP YOU?

Blogs are constantly creating new business opportunities. While some time ago blogs were almost an exclusive territory for non-professional bloggers sharing their thoughts, experiences and ideas, currently small and large business have a wide presence in the blogging world. There are a number of potential benefits of adding a blog as part of your marketing strategy or as a business model:

• Blogs spread information: Blogs allow you to publish information instantly and frequently, and the conversational nature of blogs will help you spread that published information. Not only your visitors will read it, but also other blogs will reference your content through reviews, news, comments… and will link to your site, allowing other Internet users to access that given information. In addition, your blog can capture the attention of the media, which frequently uses the blogs for source material.
• Blogs give you feedback: Most blogs allow readers to comment on your posts or link to them (and notify your site) on their own blogs. This is an automated mechanism that provides you instant feedback on any issue. You can know what your readers think of you (or your product/service/company) almost in real time.
• Blogs build you a reputation: Always you provide useful and honest content, a business blog can help position you as an expert in your niche. Blogs can be considered as a platform for expressing your knowledge, expertise and experience, so they are a powerful tool for building you a solid reputation.
• Blogs are marketing tools: Blogs are a useful and low-cost marketing tool as they improve the awareness of your product/service/company and strengthen the loyalty of your customers (readers). The word-of-mouth will provide you a way into audiences that couldn’t be reached efficiently in any other way.
• Blogs are an easy content management system: The ease of use of blogs as a content management system (CMS) will allow you to forget the programming and the design of your web site and will also help you reduce costs. You can create your blog using free blog hosting services like Blogger or run free software like Wordpress on your own web hosting (preferable for business blogs). In both cases you can adapt the appearance of your blog through free professional-looking templates (themes). This makes creating and updating web sites faster, easier and cheaper then ever.
• Blogs are search engine traffic generators: Lastly search engines have been driving their efforts to reward rich-content sites, due to the great amount of poor-content sites built with the only purpose of generating revenue with advertising. As blogs are generally based on valuable and original content, they are specially appealing to search engines.

  The linking structure inherent in blogs is another determinant in the equation. As other blogs reference your web site articles, they will link to them. Moreover, comments and trackbacks frequently include a link back to the blogger’s site. Because incoming links are one of the most important ranking factors in major search engines, it’s obvious that blogs are great platforms to generate search engine traffic.

Original article published by Javier Garca: Getting into the blogging world in Monetizing the Web
Read more articles on Blogging

Now that blogging has become so popular among everyone from the novice writer to the most experienced journalist, businesses are starting to take notice. A well-written and frequently updated blog can help market almost any type of business. Blogging can help target readers who are interested in a company’s product or service and businesses can keep track of what their readers are looking for through blogging. In addition, blogging can help link together companies that compliment each other very easily.

There is a lot of talk about blogging. Some feel that blogging is just a passing fad, but others feel it is just the beginning. Some business analysts feel that blogging does not significantly help a business market the company. Many businesses feel that this is not so. Blogging can be a beneficial way to mark a business, build an audience and help link in other companies together.

Blogging can help almost any business expose their readers to their services and products. Sometimes with new products, a blog can create interest in something new. Blogging is helpful because it can talk in depth about the product, and it can also give step-by-step instructions on how a certain product can be used. A reader, who is interested in the product after reading about it on a blog, will be more inclined to research similar products on the Internet. This can lead to a more informed consumer and can save a consumer time when shopping or researching a new product. In turn, a company may save time because customers who have read the blog are already informed about the product. These customers can also read reviews on these products and services, which can be helpful in the buying process.

Another great thing about companies using a blog for their products and services is that a blog enables the company and the customer to communicate effectively. A customer can read the blog and comment on it right away. This provides good feedback to the company and they can know what the customers want. Usually blogs will provide places for readers to leave their comments or send emails to the writer. This is a good marketing tool for businesses. People enjoy communicating about products and services that they have had good or bad experiences with and blogging provided the opportunity to do so.

Blogs can also help market a business because it will be included in search engines. When people enter certain keywords, blogs that contain those words will show up. When blogs are updated frequently, search engines can provide your company with a lot of hits. This can lead to many people looking at the company’s blog who might not otherwise have done so.

When companies use blogs, it also has the ability to create a sensation around a product and influence public opinion. This is an excellent tool for companies to use. Because of the huge popularity of blogging, this can be a more effective tool than some forms of advertising. Readers are more likely to share interesting blogs with their friends and this can help companies get the word out about their product.

Another way blogging can help market a business is that blogs often help a company position itself as a leader in a certain field. This means that those who blog can show their expertise about certain subjects and then updates this information on a regular basis. Blogging can help generate leads and send a positive message about your company without spending a lot of money for advertising. Readers can look at these blogs and know that they are dealing with a quality company.

Companies also use blogs to help network with other companies that compliment their business. This is beneficial because they can easily share their links and readers will see all of the blogs that relate to what they are searching for on the Internet. Link swapping is often used in blogging, especially with businesses.

Blogging is proving to be a beneficial marketing tool for businesses all over the world. While it’s a fairly new way for companies and customers to communicate with each other, blogging provides an immediate and unique form of advertising for the company. Customers are able to read and research products and services through blogging and companies can better understand what their customers want.

Finally! You Can Start Profiting From One Of The Hottest Types Of Products Available In All Of The Internet…And Have Your Business Up And Running In A Matter Of Hours! You may reproduce this article as long as an active hyperlink is accompanied.

My first happy surprise was a 404 page not found error. That wasn’t too
bad because at times, blogger.com has construction work going on. Generally, I
think they’re 98% spot on though.

Except of course this page not found error was really telling me something quite
obvious. Like…

Dude, your blogs have gone. So I check all my blogs and discover they’re
not communicating with me anymore, and even worse, with you. Blogger was having
a bad day. And me, well, my day was about to get a tad worse.

Shoot over to log in. I can do that ok! But I’m greeted by empty space. It’s a truism.
My blogs have gone. In cyberspace no one can hear you scream. And only a
few people will see you sob into your keyboard!

There once was five blogs there, with the most recent posting just yesterday.

So, between now and then, it’s possible a blog shark got in to my blogger account
and ate up my blogs with the delete button. Maybe blogger needs a second
authorised password for permission to delete the blog, some sort of secure system
to prevent this from happening…

…Unless they have this already? I’ve, sob, never deleted a blog

Two things you can learn from this, so that it doesn’t happen to you. The first thing
is that I wasn’t relying on the blogs for an income. The blogs weren’t supporting me.
Yet.

But they were being built up to, eventually, earn an income from affiliate, adsense
and other means…

And the second thing is that I didn’t back up my blogger template. (That’s the html
part of the blog that contains all the important linking code, google adsense html,
links etc).

So, if you’re serious about earning an income from the internet, and use blogs,
go and do the backup right now!

It’s probably a good idea to make your blog Log In password a little
complex. Mine was simply characters (letters). Whoever it was, may have come
through the backdoor, when it was open.

I’ve got a high speed connection here. I’ll need to learn more about firewalls and
security. And carry a toy gun too

So, as they say. C’est la vie. My blogs have gone, where they went, nobody
knows. What can I do but redesign them so that this time, they’re much better than
before.

Welcome to the world of the super information highway. How many shipwrecked
emails, abandoned websites or orphaned junk are floating in the spacious corridors
of the cyber world? Taking a guess - more than millions.

And back to reality… Do you keep a small book for all your Log In, passwords,
affiliate ID details? You really need to. It’s essential to keep track of Log In details
and passwords.

Set it up efficiently now, and it will be easier 3 months down the track when you’ve
got 20 different sign up IDs, passwords, affiliate codes, etc.

And for all of you who are not sure… artists use blogs too! It’s an ideal form of
expression. Instantaneous, simple, powerful, informative. Blogs are the
modern day artist’s canvas…

Artists get to express their dreams and goals in a succinct and delightful way… And
we’ve all got that creative potential inside of us.

The reason that people grow and become better and better over the course of
time, is because they persist gently in the direction of their goals and dreams.
- Brian Tracy

By the way… Your dose of high-energy creativity and motivation is now due. You
can get it at the sites below. And tell him I sent you, ok. :-0

Copyright © 2006 Martin Hurley

Martin Hurley is the Motivational Dude, artist, photographer
and netrepreneur who enthuses creativity, marketing and
life knowledge. Get your unique down to earth approach to
life success by visiting: http://Hurleypix.com
The secret blog: http://white-ape-in-thailand.blogspot.com

If Howard Dean’s failed political campaign accomplished anything, I would say that it brought to the mainstream the use of something called a weblog or “blog” as it known in cyberspace.

A blog is really nothing more than a diary uploaded to the Internet and until about the last 12 months was the realm of the individual who saw it as a way to publish there random (and sometimes disturbed) thoughts. The great thing about weblogs, and the growing set of software that is being created to publish them, is that they are a tremendous business tool.

Weblogs allow you to create content and contact…and that is what your clients crave more than anything.

I use a program (there is a free trial version) called PMachine to publish my weblog at DuctTapeMarketing.com/weblog.php. This program allows me to simply make many entries and updates and also allows readers to add comments. Better still, now seemingly random articles can be sorted and searched by content or subject. My weblog is more like a content management system and my readers seem to love it.

Another great reason to explore the use of weblogs is that search engines seem to love them. Within 30 days of launching my weblog it became the most visited page on my fairly high traffic website.

So what is it about blogs that those little spiders love so much?

Here’s a little secret, search engines crave content. Okay so maybe that’s not such a secret but to look at many websites you would think it so. The fact is that too many websites just sit there doing nothing that the search engines admire. Providing content, not to mention fresh content, is one of the toughest chores of anyone who maintains a website. But when it comes to generating traffic it is the most important job.

Blogs, by their very nature, are all about content. In a commercial environment every blog entry is fresh content. Get in the habit of making two, three, even four entries a week and you’ve got a content building bonanza on your hands. Everyone knows you need new content to give visitors a reason to come back; blogs just make the task so much easier.

Another advantage that blogs seem to currently possess over traditional web pages and sites is lack of competition. While the number of bloggers grows daily, there are still relatively few commercial blog sites. When I created my blog I found that it showed up in the number 3 spot in Google for the term “Marketing Weblog” within about 3 weeks of launch. Not bad considering I did nothing to make it happen.

There are a couple of other things you should do to make your weblog a traffic magnet. They aren’t really that different than tradition SEO tactics but the names and faces are unique to the blogging world.

Use targeted keywords in your entry titles

No rocket science here but this tip can’t be stated enough. Forget cute…go for titles that fit your targeted keywords and phrases…even if they seem a bit awkward. (You do have targeted keywords and phrases don’t you?)

Register with Blog Search Engines – Search engines that specialize in blogs

http://www.daypop.com/

http://www.blogvision.com/

http://www.blogsearchengine.com/

Register with Tracking Services – These services note when a blog has been updated and publish an ongoing list. They even keep track of the most updated and most visited weblogs. Plus you get to learn what pinging is.

http://blo.gs/

http://www.weblogs.com/

Trade Some Links

You don’t need to get out of control on this one but a few “relevant” swapped links to related blogs can boost your traffic.

Syndicate your content

This one is way to technical to cover here but do some research on the term RSS and you may discover ways to have your content and entries fed to sites that are hungry for the type of stuff you write. Many of the popular weblog software packages have this capability built right in.

http://www.feedster.com/

Copyright 2004 John Jantsch

About The Author

John Jantsch is a marketing consultant based in Kansas City, Mo. He writes frequently on real world small business marketing tactics and is the creator of “Duct Tape Marketing” a turn-key small business marketing system. Check out his blog at http://www.DuctTapeMarketing.com/weblog.php

Turn WordPress into MyCustomPress

As an avid wordpress blogger, you’ve probably visited many
wordpress sites with the default “Hello World!” comment staring
you in the face. Or looked at the default links and thought
“What is a blog roll?”. Wouldn’t you like to customize the
default links for each and every one of your future customers?

Until now, to change many default installation settings, you had
to hack the wordpress installation code. But no longer, we have
created MyCustomPress Lite for those bloggers, webmasters, and
internet marketers, who want to boldly emblazon their future
wordpress installations with their affiliate links, default
comments, default post, site URL and a couple of other
customizations.

While you are still free to hack the appropriate wordpress files
and additionally comply with the GPU license, this free
literally push-button-easy application will customize the
appropriate files and comply with the GPU license for
modifications for each and everyone of your future wordpress
installations. If you can type answers to several questions,
save/rename a file, and perform a normal wordpress installation,
then you too can have your own customized version of wordpress!

Why is it free? Simply, we think wordpress should be your blog
of choice when installing an open source blog on your server.
And we know you have special links to provide to all of your
blog clients or administrators, so why should you have to add
the links and default post/comments to each and every one of
your future blogs?

May all of your projects be successful,

Charles H. Smith

To download MyCustomPressLite, simply sign up for our periodic
WordPress Tips and Techniques newsletter at:
http://www.wp-tweaks.com. More details are found at
http://charleshsmith.com/custompress/

BLOGS… they seem to be the talk of the Internet marketing world these days, and for good reason.

Not only do the Search Engines love them for there Content Rich pages, you also have the ability to plug your Blogs “Site Feed” into an RSS feed and then have it syndicated to thousands of websites and directories giving your content more exposure to your target audience.

RSS(Real Simple Syndication) is a very Powerful technology that has been around for quite some time and when used correctly, can build an audience overnight.

If you want a crash course on what RSS is, in more depth, since the nature of this article is to show you how to get your Blogs “Site Feed” listed in Yahoo! and MSN, I’ve provided a link to a page full of articles on RSS related issues.

http://www.rss-specifications.com/rss-articles.htm

Now, depending on where your Blog is hosted, whether its through a free service like Blogger.com — http://www.blogger.com or hosted on your websites server you should have a “Site Feed URL” that has the .XML extension.

This is your “Site Feed URL”.

You’ll usually locate it within your Settings area of Blog control center.

Here’s what mine looks like as an example:
http://theiwe.blogspot.com/atom.xml

This URL is intended for a RSS News Reader, so disregard its appearance.

Once you find your “Site Feed URL”, copy and paste it into Notepad because you’ll need it for the next steps coming ahead.

Now, what you need to do is go and set-up an My Yahoo! and My MSN account.

I’ve provided the links for you below.

- My Yahoo! ==> http://my.yahoo.com

- My MSN ==> http://msn.com

It should only take you about 15-20 minutes at the most.

If you already have accounts with My Yahoo! and My MSN, read on.

This is assuming you already have your accounts set-up, so your next step is to Login to your My Yahoo! account.

When you login, you’ll be taken to your Yahoo! page immediately.

What you want to do next is go look under the Yahoo! search box to the left and click on the “Add Content” link.

This will bring you to a new page.

From there, over to the right by the “Find” button you’ll see an “Add RSS by URL” link, click on it.

A new window will open with a “Web Form”. Simply copy and paste your “Site Feed URL” from Notepad into the web form and click on the “Add” button.

Now, you should see your Blogs name infront of you. Simply click on the yellow “Add To My Yahoo!” button and your feed will be added.

The next thing you should see is your “Site Feed” with your “Headlines”.

Click on one of them, it should take you to your Blog, to the desired Headline you chose.

Your My Yahoo! page should Now have your Blogs “Site Feed” Headlines listed at the bottom.

Scroll down to check. If you don’t see them, it sometimes takes up to 24-48 hours for them to appear, so just check back later.

Now that thats done, everytime you update your Blog with NEW content, it’ll “Automatically” update on your My Yahoo! page and everybody else’s pages who have subscribe to your feed, plus, within 24-48 hours your feed will get Spidered and Indexed by Yahoo!.

Talk about getting the word out in a HURRY with very little effort on your part.

This is “Viral Marketing” at its Best in my mind.

And… it’s so simple to implement.

Okay.

Now it’s time to do the same to your My MSN account as what you did above to your My Yahoo! page.

Here’s the link to go login(click on Sign In from main page): http://www.msn.com

Once your login to your My MSN account you should see an “Add Content” link under the MSN logo to your left. Click on it.

A pop-up should now be displaying. Simply copy and paste your “Site Feed URL” from your Notepad into the web form provided and click the Search button(the green button with the arrow).

You should now be looking at Check Box with your Blogs name beside it. Check off your “Site Feed URL” and then press the OK button at the bottom.

PRESTO! Like magic… your Blogs site feed has now been added to your My MSN page which will then be spidered in the next 24-48 hours and Indexed by MSN.

That’s the Power of BLOGS(Web-Logs) and RSS(Real Simple Syndication)combined with two Internet giants.

The only thing you have to bring to the table IS, fresh, quality content that your audience WANTS, and do it on a regular basis.

I post my articles that I write on a weekly basis, making my Blog called… The Internet Wonders Blog - http://theiwe.blogspot.com - a search engine Magnet!

You can do the same because I just showed you HOW.

In conclusion, creating BLOGS and using RSS as a vehicle to syndicate your Blogs content is a Sure-Fire way to get your content spidered more frequently by search engines and the exposure it deserves, which in turn, will build you a large audience of buying customers that TRUST you.

Want to get MORE ‘Insider’ marketing Secrets on How-To drive HUGE amounts of Laser Targeted Traffic to your website? Then you need to subscribe to Cory Threlfall’s ezine called… The Internet Wonders eZine at — internet marketing

Businesses of all sizes are beginning to realize the advantage of blogging and what that activity can mean for their businesses.

Despite still being in its infancy, compared to other more mature marketing technologies, blogs are already significantly affecting businesses. That’s because, used and designed properly a blog can help you manage your website and leverage your existing content for better business visibility.

One of the best things about using a blog with your business is that it can be used in a variety of applications. Started as a simple personal journaling web application, a blog quickly mature and evolve into a business and marketing tool that some of us can’t live without.

So what can a blog do for your business?

1) Keep in touch with prospects and customers. Keep the interaction flowing and let them know you better. Demonstrate that there is a human behind your business, instead of a static website.

2) Position yourself as an expert in your niche. Regularly post about business events, share thoughts, new innovations or even provide customer service.

3) Capture leads. Engage them with content, delivered regularly through blogs, RSS feeds and e-mail.

4) Generate revenue. Selling advertising space, products, services, or build relationship and pre-sell. You to cash in your content by participating in contextual advertising program like Google AdSense, Yahoo! Publisher Network and others.

5) Boost business productivity. Used internally for communication, project management, or just a personal place to throw ideas at.

Standalone conventional websites used to adequately deliver information, but nowadays customers want more than that. We live in an information age where there is enormous amount of data being generated every single second. That has meant that end-users (clients) are beginning to shift their information consumption habit. As a result, they now demand more control over the medium, and they prefer to choose when and what information they’re going to process.

As part of the shift, consumer generated media is set to take on older web models, especially as consumers also want to participate in the market, not just as passive readers.

That’s why having a blog on your website can be a very good idea.

If customers are familiar with your product they may want to share what they think with others at your blog. On the other hand, if they’re unfamiliar with your product, they may want to hear more about what you have to offer from others.

In other words, the idea is to help them know your product better, and hopefully decide on your product when it comes time to buy.

One of the interesting things about using a blog, is that it forces people to become participatory. You find that you have no choice but to jump into the conversation. And remember, if you don’t allow people to have a say and talk on your blog, that doesn’t mean it’s the end of the conversation since they can just as easily start their own blog or leave comments on other people’s blogs.

Instead of just sitting and watching, customers want to have a conversation, where they can tell you directly what they think about a product or service that you offer. That can be scary, but it’s also valuable feedback.

Copyright 2006 Hendry Lee

Hendry Lee helps business owners leverage technologies and what they know to market their business online and actively blogs about Small Business Blogging. Subscribe to Biz Blog Tips to receive short and practical tips to start and get the most out of your blog.