Thursday, February 14, 2008

Chapter 3: Blogging Advantage to Online Business

Create a Blog to Generate Traffic and Sales for Your Online Business

Like any new technology, blogging took some time to become firmly established. However, now blogging has matured to the point where we can fully understand its marketing potential and develop proven system so you can use blog effectively to promote your business on the internet.
There are many blogging strategies techniques and tools that have now been tested and proven to work. These ranges from traffic strategies to writing techniques and from promotional tools to tips on how best to generate profit with your blog.
What this means to you is that you don’t have to waste time trying out lots of different tools and strategies to find the one that work. We have already analysed hundreds of successful blogs for you, tested our own ideas and discovered exactly what techniques and approaches generate the most interest traffic and sales for you business. All you have to do is simply follow these proven formulas for success.
Of course how you use these tools and strategies will depend very much on the blog model you choose to follow. There are 3 main business blog models:
• A blog that promotes your online business
• A blog that promotes your offline business
• A stand alone blog that generates its own revenue

The Benefits of a Blog

You can promote a blog through search engines and directories specifically designed for blogs, where there is less competition than in a regular search engine.
• A blog is more of a two way to discuss between you and your readers which gives your audience a voice and facilitates a community environment
• A blog is much more informal way that gives your business a friendly face that readers are more likely to trust and relate to
• Blog content is more frequently updated which prompts visitors to return frequently
• Create value added content to attract more visitor to you website
A blog contains so much contents, thus, it can be a great tool to use if you sell a product online. Through the posts on your blog, you can give your visitors useful information relevant to the needs of your target audience.
For instance, if you are selling an eBook on motorcycle maintenance, you can post news items on motorbike related topics and tips on keeping your bike running smoothly. Remember, this type of relevant content fives you a leg up in the search engine rankings and attract more visitors to your blog and web site.
Alternatively, if you are running a website selling scuba gear, you can write a blog entry on tips for maintaining your equipment. You can also blog about diving news and destinations and create a way for your visitors to connect with other divers.

Build a Buzz around New Products

You can also use your blog to tell your potential customers about any new products or services you had offered. In fact, this strategy is now used by some authors and publishers of eBooks and other information products who release selected parts of their working in progress to build some buzz before they actually launch the product.
But this strategy isn’t just for information products. You can virtually take any new product and release snippets of information about some of its new features and benefits to build up a sense of anticipation within your market.
A blog which can easily be updated daily which is ideal for this process. By timing it well, you could create a virtual line up of people wanting to buy your product on the launch day!
You can even involve your readers and customers in the development of new products by asking for their comments and suggestions.
As long as you are not duplicating content, running a couple of blogs and linking between them, it can be an excellent traffic strategy.
There is a blog setup specially to sell one particular product by providing interesting and relevant content that will appeal to the eBook’s target audience. By involving the readers in the book development, the author is generating a ton of interest in his book before he releases it.
In fact, this request for help with designing the cover had generated nearly 150 responses, with many readers leaving long, detailed feedbacks.

Collect Your Blog Visitors’ Email Address and grow your opt-in Email List

One of the best ways to turn your blog visitors into potential customers is to collect their email address so that you can follow up with them and market to them by email.
If you already use an opt-in form on you main sale site to grow your opt-in email list, then it will be easy to simply add another opt-in form to your blog. In this way, your blog’s visitors can sign up to receive your newsletter report or whatever you are offering and you will have a way to keep in touch with them after they left your blog.
Most importantly, you will have a way to drive those subscribers to your sales website and ultimately convert your blog visitors into paying customers.
If you don’t have an opt-in form on your main sales website, now is the time to create one. By offering your website visitors something free of charge of value for free, you will be able to collect their names and email addresses. Once you have this crucial information, you can get in touch with them again and again to offer them free information, maintaining your relationship with them and promoting your products and services to them.
Then you can add a similar opt-in offer to your blog, and use it to add your blog visitors to the mailing list for your sales site.
You can use opt-in to:
• Let your subscribers know about your latest blog posts
• Create previews of up and coming hot topics in your blog
• Send a monthly free newsletter to your subscribers
• Announce new products and services you offering from your sales website
• Promote any special offers or discounts on your products
Additionally, you can drive both your website traffic and blog visitors to you sales site where you can convert them into paying customers.
The best part is that you can handle all your opt-in automatically using software like 1shoppingcart. With auto-responders, your email marketing campaign will be 90% hand free.
Of course, before you are able to email your visitors, you have to collect their email address first. In order to do this, you will need to place an opt-in box or subscription box prominently on your blog. To get this auto-responders program, we highly recommend you to use one shoppingcart; this is a very reliable web base auto-responder program which have every feature that you need.
Email marketing is one of the most successful online marketing strategies.

Offer Paid for Content

If you are selling information such as stock tips that you have to regularly email to your customers, you can use blogging software to create a password protected content hub and there is a chargeable fee for you to access to it as an alternative or addition to the email service.
If you are selling information product like an eBook, you can offer one year free access to a blog containing valuable extra information as a form of bonus when selling your product.
They key here is to offer some of your information for free as a taster that will invite readers to subscribe for the full text and access to the complete archives. Many online news organizations and research websites do this, as do online businesses that offer members only areas of their site.

Create a Community around Your Blog

If you sell products such as camera, a blog is great for posting content like product reviews, photography tips and news that is all aimed at a very specific target audience.
A community encourages people to return again and again and you can even use this community to help you to generate ideas for new products. For example, if you sell a software application that you had developed. You can invite readers of your blog to contribute suggestions as to show how the software can be improved for the next version.
If you sell a product that is updated regularly, a blog is perfect for generating invaluable customer feedback as to how you can improve your products.

Improve your Customer Service

You can use a blog to provide answers to the questions your customers have about your products, services and other aspects of your business. When you allow your customers to post questions making your blog a kind of interactive FAQs, or you can simply post answers to common questions that your receive through customer’s email.
When you are attentive to your customers’ needs and are willing to go that extra mile to provide them with excellent service. These will make existing customers more likely to buy from you again and will encourage potential new customers to do business with you. You don’t even have to call it a blog.

Humanize your Business

One of the challenges when you are running an online business is that you have very little face to face contact with your customers. Hence, it can be lacking of a human element. A blog with an informal style is a great way to humanize your business and inject some of your own personality into it. Ultimately, you are able to make potential customers feel more comfortable buying from you.
Of course you can do this with your regular website by adding a photograph of yourself and a personal message. However, that fixed message is very much a one-way communication from you to your customers.
A blog allows you to initiate and maintain a rapport building dialogue with your audiences. It allows you to stamp some of your own personality onto your business and talk about topics and issues that are relevant to you and your target market.

Boost Our Credibility and Establish your Expertise

By offering informative and relevant information to your target audience, you will boost your credibility in the eyes of your readers. This will allows them see that there is a real person behind the web site on their computer screen
By talking knowledgeably about your subject area, you will also be able to build your reputation as an expert in your field, something that you can only help you to attract more customers and generate more sales.
Once you gain your readership, you can even release an eBook made up entirely of a collection of your post and sell in on your blog for some cash.
There is even a service call Blogbinders that allow you to turn your blog into a printed book. Cafepress is another site that allows you to create and sell your own books.
The beauty of using blog is to promote your online business is when you add more and more posts; you are effectively creating a dynamic and constantly changing content section for your web site. Additionally, by including important keywords in the content, the ones used by your target audience to search for information on your subject area, your blog will continually act as a magnet to draw traffic into your site through the search engines.
The content of your blog is not just a useful information resource for your visitors; it can also boost your credibility by showing off your expertise in your industry. You can also incorporate subtle marketing strategies such as creating a buzz around for a new product by releasing information on your blog before it launches. You can also announce the release of new products or services with a link to your website of course.
The comments feature of blogs also enables you to create a community around your online business by hosting discussion revolving around the topics you write about. The informal and personal tone of a blog can humanize your business, reassuring your customers that they are dealing with a real person and not just a website or computer.
Most importantly, there are tons of new free resources with the all the features above, you will ultimately increase your traffic and sales.


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