Blog your way to profits

Author: Florie Lyn Masarate
Long gone are the days when all you needed was a website on the Internet to be “in business” and making money. Today getting your website hosted and live on the internet is just the beginning.

If you are new to the online business arena, you will realize very quickly that you are a very small fish in a very large pond. There is a lot to learn before you can swim with the big fish.

In traditional business the term “market share” is a key element to business success. All businesses want the lion’s share of their particular market to keep that ever important ‘cashflow’ streaming and they use a number of strategies to achieve that.

Typically in traditional businesses there will be a Sales Manager and Sales Team (”Sales” is sometimes reframed “Business Development”) dedicated to getting more customers; a Marketing Budget dedicated to branding and advertising; and a Customer Service Department to keep prospective, new and existing customers happy; to name but a few.

The purpose of all this is to get the customer/client to their door spending money - An internet based business is no different.

So how do you, the online home business owner, achieve big fish status?

There are a number of ways to get that all important steady stream of visitors to your door; that highly prized money spending “traffic”. We haven’t got time to go into all of them in detail but one strategy in particular that I’d like to bring to your attention is “Blogging”.

A blog is a website where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order. The term “blog” is a contraction of “Web log”.

Blogs often provide commentary or news on a particular subject; some function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic. Most blogs are primarily textual although some focus on photographs (photoblog), videos (vlog), or audio (pod casting), and are part of a wider network of social media.

It is a quick and easy way to communicate with your prospective and existing customers. It adds personality to your website and facilitates building a relationship with your visitors.

Your blog can be hosted on your website using RSS feed so for all intent and purposes your blog will look like just another page in your site.

A feature of a blog, that’s not available in a website, is the ability for your visitors to comment on your posts; so the communication can be two way. Customers are more likely to buy from someone they know and trust, especially on the internet.

More importantly, when done right, a blog becomes a viral marketing tool.

If the content of your blog has relevance to your website subject, and is engaging for your visitors, it is an excellent way to attract targeted traffic. By capitalising on social networking behaviour, your blog and your website by association, will receive more interested traffic.

So yes, blogging will help your online business. In fact I would go as far to say it is necessary! If you haven’t got a Blog for your website you need to get one!

Keywords: online business, business, website, blog, blogs, blogging, traffic, visitors, customers

About the Author
Dee-Dee MacLeod-Wilson
deedee@wanttoworkfromhome4life.com