Excuse me, Can you spare a blog?

Tip for the day: Don't be so quick to ignore the begging blogger. What exactly is a begging blogger? Well, you might have been approached by someone asking to blog about your product or service in exchange for a small, or not so small fee. Some are quick to dismiss this social media avenue with a high potential for real revenue. Blogging is too often associated with senseless rambling, and many businesses feel no need to invest-often chopping it up to a waste of advertising budget. However, there is a very good reason why you (especially for small business owners, and start ups) should not ignore. I've read many articles and one in particular resonated with me. http://basicblogtips.com/guest-blogging-traffic-stats.html. You will notice the author mentions a 9% increase in the amount of traffic that hit her blog. Can you imagine what 21K plus visitors could do for your profit margins? (Check the link if you want to know where I got this number from). While blogging is not a definite promise of sales increases, you can at least get much needed exposure. This is important for start ups, or those who have seen slow business growth. As a business owner you want people 1) aware of your business, but 2) talking about your business. And you want the talking to be positive. We will get into that in a later post.

As a person addicted to shopping I can tell you that the first thing I do before making any purchase is to research it. Check out this article on social commerce: http://www.bazaarvoice.com/resources/stats. Apparently, I am not the only one that does such research. When I research a product I want to know first what others think about it, and what they are saying. If there is a product with 99% of the people saying the product is horrible-guess who wont be making a purchase? The same can be applied to services. If I see a negative review of a service there are high chances I will take my business elsewhere. Psychology calls me a fearful buyer. I tend to think of myself as an educated buyer. But hey with the current state of the economy, and my pockets, my hard earned money deserves a few reservations. Here is another link: http://www.memphisdailynews.com/editorial/Article.aspx?id=54067. It delves more into the psychology of shopping. Its important to note "the emotional portion of your brain sends more signals to the rational, than vice versa...meaning a lot of purchasing decisions are based on emotion". What does all this ying yang mean in laymens terms. When you see a product review a lot of it is based on emotion and personal opinion. You want your customers to be sharing positive emotions because these are the emotions that will grab newer, or potential customers. Especially if those customers are like me.

I've probably digressed a bit but the main point is utilize blogging. If you don't have time to blog yourself pay the extra money to have a team of dedicated bloggers to discuss your product. Collect their feedback, and make adjustments if  possible. You might feel you can do this on your own however, you might not have access to the large number of potential customers that a dedicated blogger would. Besides, you can use your time to focus on other aspects of your business. Remember there is no promise of sales, but at least there is attention. Good Luck.