Attracting Readers to Your Blog

By Catherine Seda

A blog isn't a website. Simply repurposing your site content, press releases or brochures on your blog means death in the blogosphere. When blogging for business, you have to change what and how you communicate.

According to an April 2006 study by blog search engine Technorati, about 75,000 new blogs are created daily. There are about 1.2 million blog posts every day, or about 50,000 posts each hour.

That's an overwhelming number of messages vying for the attention of blog readers. To catch their attention, you've got to connect with them, not just throw information at them.

How can you do that? Be a storyteller from your industry. Share your personal insights, favorite resources and relevant statistics. Reveal your name and the position you hold in your company. Blog readers don't want a company voice; they want a personal one. And the voice doesn't only have to be yours. Ask several key employees to post periodically. This spreads the workload while giving prospects a more personal look at your team. Getting personal is great for business.

Before you get too personal, though, make sure you relate the right kind of information. A ski resort owner could absolutely discuss her crazy crashes on the slopes, and a pet store owner can certainly share silly stories about his pets. Those postings are relevant. But an online diary won't likely bring in new business.

Focus on making your blog a fun and informational industry resource. If you do, other blog and website owners will link to you quickly. A company blog has a better chance of getting links than a company site does. Not only will you score direct traffic from these links, you'll also get greater link popu-larity, which boosts your blog in organic search results. To further boost your search engine rankings, use keywords in your blog posting titles that are relevant to your business.

Effective blog marketing isn't simply setting up a blog. Invite your future customers into your conversation with what you say and how you say it.

Speaker and freelance writer Catherine Sedaowns an internet marketing agency and is author of Search Engine Advertising.