Business Blogging 101

Business Blog Marketing is an Affordable Method to Increase Search Engine Rankings and Market your Business

If you haven't read about the ongoing updates and discussions about business blogging, you are missing out on one of the more effective methods of increasing your company's Web site visibility among the search engines.

Creating a business blog marketing campaign is the "most explosive outbreak in the information world since the Internet itself," as BusinessWeek.com stated in February 2008. If you're not using a business blogging feature on your Web site or linking to one, you may be missing out on a very important opportunity. Creating and maintaining a daily or weekly business blog marketing program is not only cost-effective, but many business blog sites can be setup without investing a penny. Blogging for your company's product or service is no longer an option for businesses, it's a prerequisite, according to BusinessWeek.com.

Facts You Should Know Before Creating a Business Blog Marketing Program

     • The majority of information comes from digital formats such as email, podcasts, online video, blogs, government filings, text messaging and photos from camera phones. And every one can be instantly broadcasted via the Internet.

     • In early 2008, it was estimated by Technorati that approximately 112 million blogs were online and 40,000 new blogs were being created every day. However, not all blogs created are actively maintained, which also affects search engine rankings.

     • Setting up a business blogging site is minimal, but incredibly powerful not only for your company, but also to the thousands of potential people who will read it.

     • You don't have to have a degree in English or journalism to write a blog, and anyone in your company can write a blog too. Ensure the people you designate write only in favor of the company, and not against it. One negative blog post can literally reduce a company's rankings online and with its investors.

     • Business blogging can be a vehicle for making corporate decisions, annoucements, mergers, offering new products and services and celebrating milestones.

 • Your company can save on traditional marketing campaigns by switching to a business blog marketing campaign with little to no cost to you.

Still not convinced that a business blog is appropriate for your corporation? Try this instead - conduct a Google search on one or all of the following keywords: business blogs, blog marketing, corporate blogging. Did you notice the search results for these words? It's highly competitive. If business blog marketing is competitive, then it is certainly something that your company may have overlooked.

5 Tips for Designing Your Business Blogging Site

1. Decide whether you'll use a stand alone domain or directory or customizable blog software such as WordPress.
2. Customize blog design to reflect the purpose and feel of your business
3. Optimize your business blogging site with researched keywords to use as tags and categories. These will also be used in your headlines, title and even the name of your blog url. For example, instead of just using your company's name incorporate a keyword into your blog's URL such as Organicsemseo.com.
4. Enable Widgets - those sidebar bits of information on every blog post. Popular widgets for business blogging are the following:
     • Archives - stores all the blog posts by month/year
     • Comments - allows others to leave comments, but always choose "Moderated" so you can filter through any spam or negative replies
     • Allow trackback and pings - increases your visibility among the search engines and other blog sites
     • Tracking statistics - shows which business blogging posts receive the most reads
5. Enable moderation on every comment for your business blogging site; otherwise, you may find an overload of spam or someone who bashes your company negatively. When you are able to moderate the comments, you can edit the comments then post or choose not to post them at all. You are in control. You may want to assign someone else in your company with this task, so you can focus on other blog marketing tasks.

If you have further questions or need assistance with setting up a business blog marketing campaign, the Search Circus team is available to help your company get its business blog marketing off the ground. Contact us today!