Blogging has been practiced by people online for many years now but has only become popular in last few years. People especially teenagers now use blogging as a way of expressing their fears, concerns or just as a way of keeping in touch with their friends online. Marketers have also realized that blogging, if done well, is one of the best free advertising methods available to promote their products and/or services.
What exactly is blogging?
People in the past used to hand write journals about their business or diaries about their personal lives. A blog is the widely used term that refers to web log which is really just an online journal. Blogs themselves can be free to set up and used for anything from a fun leisure activity to promoting a business.
Blogging for your internet business is becoming very popular and can be quite lucrative. However using a blog for an offline business can also be used to promote your business for free. As more and more people use the internet for information about what products and services are available to solve their problems, blogging will increase the awareness of your products and/or services.
How do you set up a blog?
A blog can be set up very simply by following the instructions on one of the free blogging sites of Blogger, LiveJournal Weebly, HubPages or Squidoo to name a few.
If you already own a website a blog can be set up on the same domain using a free platform such as WordPress. Most hosting platforms now offer a very simple way of creating a WordPress blog through their cPanel. Just login and follow the instructions.
How to use a blog to advertise your business online.
Keep your customers and subscribers informed of the latest news in your industry and how it affects them. Announce your new products in your blog even though you have added them to your main website. More and more people as subscribing to blog feeds which will alert them about your new blog entries. Express your opinions, advice and views on specific products and/or services related to your business. Write reviews of the products you sell giving a balanced view of the benefits and drawbacks. Leave the sales pitch to your main website. Include links that other websites for further relevant information about your products and/or services as these will improve your SEO (search engine optimization) and improve your ranking in the search engines. A good way of achieving this is to add well written articles as well as your original content to your blog. Extra income can be earned by affiliate links embedded in your blog posts. Invite your blog readers to comment on your blog entries. This will help build your expert status with your readers and their feedback will help you improve your business. Comment on other blogs that compliment your business to gain valuable back links to your blog and main website. Find a forum in your industry and write informative posts but avoid use them to sell your products. Use your forum signature to do your selling.
