Is Blogging Part of Social Media?

Dear Moxie Maven

Is blogging part of social media? I have listened to your blog talk radio program and you mentioned that everyone in business should have a blog. I don’t even know the first step to take in getting one. Can you help me?

Help Me Blog

Dear Help Me Blog,

Let me start by answering your first question with a resounding, yes! Blogging is an integral part of social media. A blog is simply two words that were combined: web and log. The word web simply means that the writing resides on the World Wide Web, or the Internet. The word log is akin to a ship’s log, or a journal of events. So a blog is simply a journal of events that is posted online.

In business it is generally a good idea to be the first to your marketplace with any pertinent news in your industry. Once you are recognized as an authority in your industry your customers will begin to look to you for all the answers they need. A blog is the perfect place to make this happen.

Most blogging software is free. It is your choice of hosting that can change the price of operating a blog. There are two very popular web sites that will host a blog for you, for no cost: www.blogger.com and my favorite www.wordpress.com.

You may also want to consider a self hosted blog which will give you more flexibility, including the ability to use a domain name of your choosing. The difference is you will now incur cost for the domain purchase, as well as a monthly hosting fee.

I always encourage using a self hosted solution, simply because it gives you more control over your blog. When you are first starting out going the route of blogging for free is very appealing, however, as your popularity grows you may find a hosted solution very restrictive.

There are many technical aspects to making the decision between hosted and self hosted; I have prepared a report that will be posted on www.MoxieMafia.com to help you make the right decision.

However, more importantly, I want you to understand the importance of blogging in general. I have listed three reasons you should be blogging for business:

1. It doesn’t matter your industry, I am 99.9% certain that someone in your industry is using blogging to reach your target audience. Each day you wait they are stealing away more of your audience.
2. Customers are very sophisticated now and use the web extensively to search for answers from, “What’s for dinner tonight?” to treatments for very complex diseases. If they are searching for answers from your industry, you want your blog to answer it for them.
3. In all social media marketing plans you need to have a center point. It is this center point that all your web traffic will eventually get to, no matter what social media site they find you on. A blog is a perfect center point.

Blogging is not a magic pill. It won’t have people pounding down your door the minute you post your first article. It will take time, marketing efforts, and a concerted effort to get people to your business blog.

Remember when I said that blogging is a part of social media? In all social media it should be about building relationships, which means It starts and ends with trust you build with your readers over time.

Enough talk, now go blog!

Published on 8/31/09 in the Grand Junction Free Press.