Do you need a blog?
By Adam
November 27, 2009
Small Business & Entrepreneurship
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"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
- Quote famously misattributed to former IBM Chairman Thomas Watson
Funny in hindsight. But to be fair, tons of innovations come and go. The ones that stand the test of time – which become part of what we call trends – do really transform the way we live our lives or do our work. (Think, for instance, about air travel, a mouse or mobile phones.)
I’ll go out on a limb and say social media in general and blogs in particular are here to stay. Proof (besides the fact you’re reading this one)?
· 133,000,000 – blogs indexed by Technorati since 2002
· 346,000,000 – people globally who read blogs (comScore March 2008)
That’s a lot of eyeballs with the potential to discover your small business and read your big ideas.
So why not a blog?
“Building business through social media is not something most small businesses are doing very well right now,” says Roger Pierce, co-founder of BizLaunch.ca. “Like a lot of new inventions, social media holds plenty of promise yet it is failing to deliver for small business owners.”
The problem? Unlike established forms of marketing like newspaper ads or TV commercials, small business owners don’t really yet understand how to use the new technology medium – which isn’t a complete surprise since the rules are only just being developed.
So, back to my question in the header: do you need a blog? The answer is a definite maybe. As with any new marketing tactic, learn all you can then decide if you want your business to dive in.
I’ll offer more thoughts and tips on developing a blog for your small business in the next few posts. Until then, here are two great resources to get you started – if you haven’t already:
If you’ve already launched a blog, how has it helped your business? If you haven’t, what’s stopping you?
- Quote famously misattributed to former IBM Chairman Thomas Watson
Funny in hindsight. But to be fair, tons of innovations come and go. The ones that stand the test of time – which become part of what we call trends – do really transform the way we live our lives or do our work. (Think, for instance, about air travel, a mouse or mobile phones.)
I’ll go out on a limb and say social media in general and blogs in particular are here to stay. Proof (besides the fact you’re reading this one)?
· 133,000,000 – blogs indexed by Technorati since 2002
· 346,000,000 – people globally who read blogs (comScore March 2008)
That’s a lot of eyeballs with the potential to discover your small business and read your big ideas.
So why not a blog?
“Building business through social media is not something most small businesses are doing very well right now,” says Roger Pierce, co-founder of BizLaunch.ca. “Like a lot of new inventions, social media holds plenty of promise yet it is failing to deliver for small business owners.”
The problem? Unlike established forms of marketing like newspaper ads or TV commercials, small business owners don’t really yet understand how to use the new technology medium – which isn’t a complete surprise since the rules are only just being developed.
So, back to my question in the header: do you need a blog? The answer is a definite maybe. As with any new marketing tactic, learn all you can then decide if you want your business to dive in.
I’ll offer more thoughts and tips on developing a blog for your small business in the next few posts. Until then, here are two great resources to get you started – if you haven’t already:
· www.bizlaunch.ca, which conducts free seminars and webinars on using social media tools like blogs to market your business.
· John Moore’s blog offers some straight talk about your social media plan.
If you’ve already launched a blog, how has it helped your business? If you haven’t, what’s stopping you?