I’ve gone on about it enough at this stage but as I seem to be giving more and more private and public training classes on Business Blogging (there’s an additional afternoon course on in Galway on Thursday now by the way 🙂 ) I thought I’d try and create a public page of testimonials/case studies where those that have Business Blogs can tell others what the advantages having a blog are. What advantages have you seen by having a business blog for your business?
Damien Mulley
Invisible people have invisible rights
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I’ve been using wordpress to blog since about last autumn – was never really sure what blogging was or how it could benefit untill I read up on it and attended a few courses here in Leitrim.
I came up with a plan of action to write as much about my business area (web design, computers etc..) as I could in an effort to make my site a resource and bring in extra hits.
Since I started blogging my google rank has gone to 4, I’m all over the internet for certain keywords and my alexa page rank (measure of your sites importance on the net) has dropped like a stone, going from about 5,000,000 to 464,000th most popular site on the net as of now!
More and more work and opportunities are coming from my site now as a result of all this so blogging is basically the best thing since sliced bread..!
Here it is:
http://www.reverbstudios.ie/blog
Great thinking
Any advice on Business Blogging will be invaluable, as it is such a new area for many people.
I’ve been blogging for over a year and a half now and have found it to be invaluable for both our website and retail shop .
Firstly people buying online from us are more confident as they know who and what we are and also what we look like . If a customer is considering spending 4 or 5 grand on a bike they want to be sure that they get the right one . Usually there will be an average of 5 to 6 emails with questions regarding sizing , gear options , component options etc. and because of our blog they can picture who they are corresponding with and feel confident that we can give them the correct advice . A trust is created .
Secondly , the catchment area for our shop has literaly doubled in radius . We used to have people travelling from within 60 miles of our shop now that is 120 miles and as that includes both Dublin and Cork cities the difference is huge . How do we know that the blog has helped to bring the customers to us ? because 90% of new customers in the shop mention it to us during conversation .
I try to keep the blog varied with technical posts , entertaining posts and some youtube videos along with a regularly updated flickr gallery . I also keep it to what I know and understand and try to write posts that I would like to read myself .
I have zero computer expertise and have just picked it up as I go along so if I can do it anyone can .
Our blog is http://www.worldwidecyclesblog.com
Blogging has been very positive for me. I initially started Blogging 18 months ago to provide more feedback to my customers and act as a support for my monthly newsletter.
However it has proven much more valuable than that. There is of course the extra traffic to my site as a result of the blog and improved search rankings.
I have had a number of customers, I can think of three off the top of my head, who used my blog as a refence before asking me to work with them.
Some of my posts have also been picked up by more influential information security Blogs and referenced by mainstream journalists which in turn has raised my profile.
The blog reaching the final of the best business blog for the past two years has also been a big factor as has being selected as blog of the week by the Irish times.
Finally my blog was a major factor in me landing my recent book deal. The book is about information security, in particular the ISO 27000 standard, and is due out January of next year.
As a small company the blog has been an excellent and very cost effective way for me to promote my expertise anrd services. I would strongly recommend Blogging to anyone wishing to promote their business.
[…] some nice case studies/endorsements for Business Blogging now, have you got […]
I started a blog a couple of years ago as a way of updating/supplementing our News page on our webstite at http://www.ummera.com.
As our private customer market is very seasonal, I used to do an email newsletter once or twice a year, but there was a need to have more regular information/comment going to our customers. A blog was an obvious solution.
However, one of the restraints of blog is that our customers are, on the whole, reluctant to get involved with RSS feeds etc, and are probably not very tech savvy. So my words of wisdom don’t really get to our target market.
The other big challenge is making posts on a regular basis. I find myself composing these wonderful posts when in the car, a long way from computers, and by the time I am back at base, those instant thoughts at the time have vanished and other challenges are being dealt with!
I do sometimes wonder if the world of blogs and bloging is too time consuming, but there is no doubt that the potential is there, and they should obviously be part of the marketing mix of any company.
Damien
I emailed you at length about this the other day 🙂
Michele
[…] a lot. Damien has asked for case studies from Irish businesses on the advantages and you can read them all here. The first reply comes from Leon Quinn of Reverb Studios. Posted in General | Leave a […]
I’ve been threatening to dip my toe into the company blogging realm for ages but keep putting it off. I think hearing everyone’s experiences helps prove that there is value in blogging from a business point of view. Let’s just hope there are people out there who are willing to read my ramblings!