"Blogging" For Fun & Profits
© Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
http://www.thenetreporter.com
Unless you've been under a rock for the last
year, you've heard the term "blog" once or twice.
To most people, a "blog" simply represents
a glorified online "diary" where geeks, computer nerds,
and lonely teenagers record their thoughts in cyber-space.
However, many people don't realize that "blogs"
are quietly revolutionizing the way companies and customers
interact about everything from existing products to new ideas
and improvements in customer service.
In short, "blog" style communication
has come of age and anyone with an online business better sit
up and take notice fast!
In the beginning, "blogs" were basically
an online diary to record your thoughts; but "blogs"
have now evolved into dynamic websites that non-technical people
can update immediately without html editors or ftp programs.
Blogs allow their authors to make instant website
updates through a computer anywhere in the world with a Web
browser and Internet connection.
Blogs also allow readers to respond to the author's
posts, provide additional information, links, expanded opinions,
and more.
In short, an active "blog" creates
an interactive community with the author as the hub and the
readers as the spokes of the wheel that keep the whole cycle
turning round.
Unlike traditional "static" web pages
where content rarely (if ever) changes, an active blog evolves
in a state of constant and never-ending renewal.
With blogs, smart online businesses re-discovered
a principal that small "mom and pop" stores understood
for years: know your customers and stay in close tune with their
wants, needs, and desires.
Large companies throw billions of dollars down
a black hole every year to literally "guess" what
people want to buy. Most call it the "Marketing Department."
On the flipside, smart online businesses understand
that blogs allow you to avoid guessing what's on your customers'
minds and provide an active and up-to-the-minute means for them
to tell you exactly what they do and don't like about your services,
products, and virtually any other aspect of the market.
This lightning fast communication makes it possible
for small companies to literally snatch huge market share away
from more traditional companies.
Blogging also has a distinct advantage over
traditional email newsletters in that subscribers can get udpates
without having to receive an email message. Through the power
of RSS (real simple syndication), subscribers get notified of
updated content though an rss news reader.
Bottom Line: publishing a blog with an RSS feed
that your readers can subscribe to means your content NEVER
gets blocked by a SPAM filter.
Blog software basically comes in 2 flavors:
hosted and stand-alone. Hosted blogging solutions make it extremely
easy to get set up with a blog, often in just a couple of minutes.
If you know how to type, you can create a blog.
Log on to Blogger.com and you can set up a blog free of charge
and start posting in just a few minutes.
Blogger.com (owned by search giant, Google)
will even host your blog on their servers.
Typepad.com, which charges as little as $4.95
per month, is also an excellent hosted service offering additional
features that enable you to quickly get your own blog up and
running.
The alternative is stand-alone blogging software
installed on your own website.
A very popular solution is Moveable Type, available
from moveabletype.org, which provides a very versatile and powerful
suite of tools for creating a full-featured blog to rival that
of any size company in the world.
<-- Side Note -->
Moveable Type is the solution I've chosen for
my blog at http://www.IGottaTellYou.com/blog/
<-- End Side Note -->
Whichever blogging solution you choose, if you
plan to successfully conduct any form of business online, understand
that a "blog" must form an integral part of your overall
plan for customer communication and interaction.
Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist
and the co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you
how to use fr^e articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted
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