What is a Blog and How Can It Help Your Business?

I decided to write this article because it has come to my attention how little many of us in the contractor community know about this huge phenomenon called blogging, and how this usually free and simple practice can actually grow your business.

Blogs are simple programs that allow anyone to quickly and easily publish content on the web. The main goals of a blog are to express your thoughts, communicate ideas and even talk with your customers, or as a vehicle to promote your product or services.

If you want official definitions here are a few:

blog: an online diary; a personal chronological log of thoughts published on a Web page; also called weblog; typically updated daily, blogs often reflect the personality of the author.*

blog: a shared on-line journal where people can post diary entries about their personal experiences and hobbies; "postings on a blog are usually in chronological order" [syn: web log] **

blog: a blog (an abridgment of the term web log) is a website, usually maintained by an individual, with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.***

*Webster's New Millennium™ Dictionary of English, Preview Edition (v 0.9.7)Copyright © 2003-2008 Lexico Publishing Group, LLC
**WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
*** From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



Producing a blog or blogging is an immensely growing practice because it is so easy to set up and is usually free. As of June 2008, Technorati, an internet search engine for searching blogs, indexed over 112.8 million blogs and over 250 million pieces of tagged social media.

So, if you are wanting to reach internet savvy homeowners, a blog is a good idea.

There are many places to sign up for a blog, and it is usually fast and simple. Here are a few that you may want to consider:

www.blogger.com Owned by Google

www.blogstream.com

www.blogster.com

These blogs are free but some will contain advertisements. I like Blogger the best. Blogger requires no advertisements and it is very easy to set up. I like the fact it is owned by Google.


USING YOUR BLOG FOR BUSINESS

There are two main reasons why I recommend blogging.

We all want more leads, and in today’s economy every lead is becoming more and more precious. A blog creates another page on the web that gives positive information about you or your business.

1. Blogging generates more leads by driving search engines to your website. This is a proven strategy; the idea is that when a homeowner searches for your services using Google, Yahoo, or other search engines (for example typing in roof replacement, dallas, texas) there is a good chance that your Blog will show up as a search result -- hopefully ahead of your competitors. The homeowner clicks on your Blog, reads the article, and then is directed to your website to learn more about you.

It is important to know that search engines are looking for fresh content and want to give the person searching the best possible search result, so you must keep your Blog current and have it updated at least monthly. This also means that it is important to make sure that your blog is optimized for search engines. This involves making sure that your blog contains the most popular keywords that homeowners use to search for your services so your blog can be found by the search engines.

2. The second reason blogging is a good idea for your business is because it allows you to easily share your thoughts about your services and yourself in a simple and more personal way. The homeowner is hoping to find a contractor he or she can trust, and a blog will allow you to help them understand a little more about you as a person and not just as a business owner.

Blog Ideas:

· announce a recently received award
· announce a special event
· mention community involvement
· announce addition of a new team member
· announce birth of a baby
· announce a new product or service
· announce anniversary of long term employee or retirement

The bottom line is that you can write about anything, and if you are trying to establish trust and confidence, letting the homeowner understand a little more about you as a person will go a long way. You are more than just a contractor. You are a real person trying to provide a quality service with honesty and integrity.

One interesting benefit of a blog is that readers can respond to your blog and post their comments to what you have to say. With most blogs, you control who can read and write to your blog. You can choose whether you want to allow comments and you can delete any comments you don't like. This is a good feature in the event that someone decides to take advantage of your blog by posting false and negative comments about you. So you will want to review your blog on a regular basis and monitor all feedback if you decide to allow readers to post comments to your blog.

I have set up a few Blogs for some of my customers and you can see how they are using them at:

www.francisharvey.com
www.villagebuilders.ca
www.advancedroofing.biz

After we set these blogs up we created a link on their website called Our Blog to allow homeowners to find it easily when they visit their site.


CONCLUSION

I hope this article has been informative and helps you understand blogging and how it can help your business. If you have any questions blogs or comments about this article, please let me know.
I can be reached at jlawrence@lawrencemg.com or directly at 214-215-6048.

P.S. Please contact me for help setting up your first blog.