Learn About Blogging
A “blog” or “weblog” burst into the mainstream vocabulary with the 2004 U.S. Presidential  election. Since then, blogs have entered the forefront of the communication changes taking place on the web.
A blog is a web-based publication that normally displays articles, writings, pictures, video, music, rich media and more, usually in reverse chronological order. They are inexpensive to create and allow for real-time communication with readers. It’s very easy to update blogs and blog entries are searchable, enabling wider audiences to find your material. Many blogs enable visitors to leave comments, creating a community of people centered on the blog.
Business Blogging & the Blogosphere
The term “blogosphere” refers to the totality of all blog-related websites. Blogs range from those produced as individual diaries to those written by communities of writers. Blogs can be for internal company use only or viewed by the general public (external).
There are many purposes of business blogs. Some of RSS Ray’s favorites include:
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Reaching Customers and Prospects - as people are turning away from traditional mass media (television, newspaper, radio) to internet-based sources (search engines, blogs, podcasts, videocasts, viral marketing, social networks, etc) for information, purchasing, lifestyle, etc.
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Marketing, including enhancing brand recognition and awareness, creating “buzz”
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Selling Stuff (my publisher says to refer to this as “eCommerce” selling…I prefer using the term “stuff”)
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Building Customer Loyalty, including customer satisfaction and repeat purchasing
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Communicating with Employees
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Communicating with Project Team Members
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Viral Marketing Tools
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Website
Blog formats vary widely, with most entries date and time stamped. “Tagging” of blogs has become important as a method of classification and identification of the blog entry for search engine indexing. Most blogs allow for archiving and classification of older entries while generating a static address for them, often referred to as a “permalink.” Most blogs also send update alerts to readers that have requested such notification.
Blog entries are often delivered to users via RSS. You can learn more about RSS by clicking here.
Who Reads Blogs
It depends on the subject matter of the blog. As a general rule, if you can associate demographics with the subject matter of the blog, you’re safe associating that same demographic to readers of the blog.
The whole world associated with blogging in changing very rapidly. For current blog reader demographic information, check out our recent show listings on blogging.
More about Blogging
Here are some things you can do to learn more about Business Blogging:
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Read the other sections of RSS Ray's web site. Some of the information Ray provides include starting your blog, the web's most comprehensive free listing of blog search directories and search engines, a complete "toolkit" for marketers using blogging, the web's most comprehensive free listing of Blog advertising networks and a list of consultants that can help you with your blogging initiatives.
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Listen to previous "Online Marketing with RSS Ray" radio shows about blogs. You can access them by clicking here.
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Subscribe to our blog.
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Listen to the "Online Marketing with RSS Ray" show each week on wsRadio.com, the world-wide leader in internet talk. Click here if you'd like the podcast version of the show to come automatically to you.
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RSS Ray and his team of associates offer complete online marketing services for businesses with a specialization in blogging, podcasting, videocasting, and RSS marketing. Ray helps you improve you revenues, profits and customer loyalties. To arrange a free consultation with Ray, click here.
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