Saturday, March 21, 2009

How To Know If You Should Start a Blog

It is believed by most experts that blogging is a financial mistake for most small businesses. Blogs are best used for news-oriented sites, or sites that feature "the latest" or "the thought of the day."

However, blogging can also be a strong "add-on" to a successful, profitable website. For this reason, we will examine how to look at blogging vs having a website and how to know if you should start a blog.

Several companies offer blogging software, and Blogger is probably the most widely used free blogging platform available. Blogger, owned by Google, allows you to set up a blog quickly using its design templates. Other widely used blogging software include WordPress and TypePad.

Blogs must be updated frequently -- several times a week, if not daily or even several times a day -- in order to hold readers' attention. Bloggers must scrupulously adhere to the golden rule of blogging: "Thou must update frequently."

It is a time-consuming process because people who read blogs expect a certain amount of fresh content on a regular basis -- at a minimum, weekly -- preferably several times a week. This is not true of a theme-based website.

Blogging should definitely be used in combination with other marketing methods and not in isolation. They should NOT be used to build career momentum because they are not right for everyone -- especially if you don't have a strong viewpoint or valuable information to share.

Blog posts, in contrast to conventional websites, do not have a specific order. The software lacks what businesses do need to actually make money (which is the ultimate goal). They interlink to each other with gusto, creating what they call "the blogosphere.

Ultimately, they merely keep adding new posts, one after another, without editing out the old and without pulling related posts together into cohesive and fresh articles whereas, theme-based content sites develop and update the content into more complete, useful, cohesive articles called "web pages."

Bloggers rave about how blogs are "more dynamic" and "promote conversations," but many prominent bloggers turn commenting off! This communication medium is heavily covered by both online and offline media because they "get" the concept.

Bloggers, of course, form part of the online media and is actually for a very small percent of the population. It has become very popular in the last few years and even the most non-technical of netpreneur are now using a blog to promote their businesses.

Blogs have come a long way in a very short time, but again, they're not for everyone. A lot of people don't want to read their own company blogs. It has to fit into the corporate culture.

Blogs about your company and your products may sound interesting to you, but people rarely tune into a "commercial" blog unless there is additional information of real value.

Blogging may not be suitable for all small businesses, say blogging experts in a New York Times report. However, they do provide a simple way for family and friends to stay connected from different parts of the world by sharing stories, photos, videos and more.

Find out If You Should Start A Blog. Make your Business a success. Take the Video Tour!

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