January 16, 2008 Comments (17)
"Our business is really growing nicely on a very very small marketing budget, and I attribute a lot of that (growth) to the blog. In 06 our growth was 30% and in 07 year-to-date it's 40%."
"In the time I've been with the company, within the first two years we have doubled sales. And obviously it would be nice to say that it's all about the blog, because I'm such a blog proponent, but I know that that's been a key ingredient to it, because it's allowed me to reach people."The hype has swirled around the potential of blogs as a marketing tool to help grow companies and small businesses for years now. Finally, companies are beginning to report results that validate the hype.
Considering the costs, free, there is no good reason not to blog. If you are a business person who "doesn't have anything to say", hire a blogger. Part-time if you have to.
Terry I can't completely agree on hiring someone else to blog for you. The problem with this approach is that they won't understand your business, or have the passion for it that you do. I would much rather have someone that owns or works for the business to try their hand at blogging, before they turn it over to someone else.
So this post seems to be mostly about how blogging companies raise their brand value inside the blogger community. Now my question would be: What effect does that have in the end on sales? Don't get me wrong, I advocate blogging and getting involved in a conversation myself but I always wonder what power these bloggers really have (ok, admitted in a world of Google companies probably don't want to find themselves in a result list with a negative blog post on #1 but I still wonder).
I agree completely Mack. Unfortunately, getting some people to blog about their business can be almost impossible. Larger organizations have the opportunity to have different employees of different departments do some blogging but that is not always the case for the little guy.
"So this post seems to be mostly about how blogging companies raise their brand value inside the blogger community. Now my question would be: What effect does that have in the end on sales? Don't get me wrong, I advocate blogging and getting involved in a conversation myself but I always wonder what power these bloggers really have (ok, admitted in a world of Google companies probably don't want to find themselves in a result list with a negative blog post on #1 but I still wonder)."
It's not about the power of the bloggers so much as it is the power of a company being willing to listen and talk to current and potential customers. The blog is just a very effective way of doing this.
For example, let's say you want a bicycle and you do what most people do, and go to Google to see what's out there. You might come across Schwinn's website, which probably gives you plenty of technical info about their bicycles, and tells you how to locate and contact your local Schwinn dealer.
Then you come across the MasiGuy blog. You get the same technical info on bicycles, but you learn about the Masi company by reading the blog of a brand manager named Tim Jackson. You find out that Tim is pretty much like most of us, he drives his daughter to school every day (with pictures), and wears goofy socks to work, with pictures (ok maybe most of us don't do that). But he also walks us through how Masi bicycles are assembled, where they are assembled, and shows us the people that assembles them. And he takes us on rides and gives us reviews of Masi and even other cycling products. When you read Tim's blog, it's easy to tell that he is a genuine person, and a trustworthy person. And those qualities transfer to the company he works for.
IOW, he humanizes Masi. Sure Schwinn has brand managers too, possibly just like Tim. But they aren't letting them 'talk' to me. They let their website promote their products.
Schwinn has a website, Masi has Tim. That's a huge advantage for Masi.
"I agree completely Mack. Unfortunately, getting some people to blog about their business can be almost impossible. Larger organizations have the opportunity to have different employees of different departments do some blogging but that is not always the case for the little guy."
From a limited human resource standpoint, I can agree with small businesses sometimes struggling to find the time/people to blog. But on the flipside, a blogging small business can quickly develop an online presence that it may take a big company years to develop. Just from a Google standpoint, an active blog for Joe's General Store will eventually pass a stale website from BigCompany.com.
But on the flipside, there can be plenty of resistance to blogging in big companies as well. Robert Scoble has talked about when he worked at Microsoft, that he would go around the company with a camera and just talk to his co-workers and put the videos up on the Channel 9 website. It was a great glimpse inside the company, and helped to humanize (there's that term again) a large software company that many people did and still do see as 'evil'.
But Scoble said that there were internal memos passed around Microsoft pointedly asking 'Who the **** approved this?!?'. Because its the big company mentality that any communication needs to run through the PR department and 'be approved'. Scoble circumvented the PR department, and just let Microsoft's workers talk 'directly' to the people. If he was talking to a co-worker and their computer running Windows suddenly locked up, he wouldn't edit it out, because that really DOES happen in real life.
He showed that Microsoft isn't the 'Evil Empire', but was a group of real people doing real work. People just like most of us. This again, is why blogging works so well, because it evaporates the line that divides a company from its customers.
Mack - There's absolutely no doubt that businesses should be blogging. The return depends on the quality of the blog(s) and the type of business, but our tests with clients show a dramatic increase in traffic, a percentage of which positively turned to sales. It's all in the approach and, of course, the blogger's networking or following.
Blogging is absolutely one of the most effective ways to distribute information to an interested population. Both with posts on your own blog, and posting like this on relevant blogs.
One of the things we are testing, is "Blog Seeding" . Using structured Google searches, we are finding relevant conversations like this one in which to paricipate. Tagging posts with links back to our website.
We did this for a client with a very specific "green product". Submiting content to relevant sites, has significatnly increased his web traffic, and web sales by almost 15%
www.roundpeg.biz
We are Web Design Company in Mumbai, India. and we have been blogging for a few months now.
Our Blog has helped us in reaching out to a great number people than what are online advertising, our website and all our other web presence could do.
Our business is quite connected to the internet hence we see scope in using the blog medium, but for business out in the real world like someone who owns a store or restaurant on high street how blogs can help, is still something that i'm not quite sure.
I suppose they need to get other bloggers excited and start talking like what the winery guys did.
thanx
Alexander
Blogging today is as important as answering email.
What company wouldn't want to hear from it's customers?
Maybe the ones that don't have telephones?
The technology changes and increases the speed of the feedback loop, but the basics are the same. To succeed in business, you just
1. Find out what people what
2. Get it for them
A blog just makes this happen a whole lot faster!
Great post. am thinking of how to use this info to tackle one of the leading bad service companies in south africa, incredible connection. maybe some blogging will make them take note and try and mend their ways.
I sell glass art on my website and I also blog about the glass that I am making. I get a lot of custom orders through my blog. My blog postings rank higher with the search engines than my website. Blogging is helping me build my business.
Christine
I am quite aware of the power of blogging but have no idea how to get the major bloggers to pick up on my unique visual marketing engine.
I had a very favorable article written about it in WebProNews last Friday. Some bloggers picked it up off that article and wrote favorable blog posts, but thus far none of the major bloggers have done that.
How can I get it in front of them? It is indeed a better mousetrap. They will see that within 30 seconds.
"I sell glass art on my website and I also blog about the glass that I am making. I get a lot of custom orders through my blog. My blog postings rank higher with the search engines than my website. Blogging is helping me build my business."
Christine I think that a blog is an excellent idea in a situation such as yours, where you are making the product you are selling. Readers love seeing the creation process, and I think it helps us trust the seller since they are showing us how exactly the item is being created.
I don't believe that EVERY business should be blogging, but in a case such as yours, where the person is creating their own products, I think a blog is about the best marketing you can do to promote your business. Congrats on your success!
Jim I think we all do this from time to time. Sometimes I will work on a post for days, and then no one notices it. Other times I will tap off a post in 5 mins before I got to bed, and wake up the next morning to see that it's received dozens of links/comments overnight. Blogging is a funny animal in this regard.
If you are trying to get the attention of a particular blogger, my advice would be to link to their blog, and/or leave a comment on their blog. As time goes by, we all read more and more blogs as we meet more people. I'm not reading over 100 blogs a day. If someone wants me to read their blog, they are going to have to do something to break through the other blogs that I am already reading.
But if someone links to my blog, or comments, I will definintely see it. And that highly increases the chances of my reading their blog as a result.
Blogs do work - the same way that websites do. Even more so because of its casual and interactive nature, and because we can interact with blogs more than regular sites. The best thing about it is that it is virtually costless, yet the rewards are great. With blogs the consumer has a say -- and we provide a free service of information to the customer -- and hopefully, with the glee of great content comes the desire to consume your product or service.
Blogs are the most important thing to use for your business now. Everyone either has one or reads them.
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 If your company or small business has a blog that isn't delivering the results you were hoping for, Mack Collier can help! Mack is the author of one of the most popular marketing blogs on the internet, The Viral Garden, and a social media consultant that has advised companies of all sizes on their blogging strategies, from small businesses to companies as large as Dell. Mack can show you how to revitalize your blog and how to create content and experiences that will excite your visitors and grow your blog's readership. Every element of your blog, including content, comments, visuals, feed subscription options, sidebars and posting patterns will be examined. You will be given a detailed report that explains exactly how effective every element is, and what areas can be improved upon in order to harness your blog's full potential. Mack will show you how to turn your blog into a powerful marketing tool that's a hit with your customers, and that positions your company or small business as a leader in your industry. You can click here for more information on Mack's services, as well as prices. |
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