With the rise in popularity of new social media websites like Facebook and Twitter, can blogs still help a small business in any way? Even if companies no longer consider blogs their main online PR tool, many think that they are indeed still important. A lot of home based businesses started to alter their sites only one or two years ago, changing them from static html sites that lacked interaction to places where they and their customers could connect. A lot of this exchange of ideas occurred on a blog, where fresh products were announced or responses were made to customer input.

It’s widely recognized in the business blogosphere that the powerbloggers led the way and smaller businesses and home businesses followed. At first major blogs started more as media outlets, but ultimately became more social in nature, giving companies a good way to keep tabs on purchaser feedback, kudos, and complaints. Then when home businesses and other corporations set up to include comments on blog entries, the turnaround in its relationship with shoppers was extraordinary. Simply Put, both major corporations and smaller companies had similar experiences in this way.

A home-based business blog can provide a supplement to regular e-mail newsletters too, although some consumers might still depend on the e-mails for updates and never think about visiting the website, while others are way more proactive and check blogs frequently to find current info. Companies need to engage clients in numerous ways. If it’s updated regularly, the blog can provide fresh information that will not disappear down the page quite so fast, say, as the more ephemeral tweets on Twitter. Up-to-date business news can be posted in an amiable, casual fashion, permitting customers to ask questions or make suggestions. And their remarks w’t disappear down the page either.

Businesses must be careful about raising consumers’ expectations, however. While an almost one on one relationship might be possible between a home business and its customers, larger corporations might not be able to make a response to all questions or complaints, and this could damage its reputation if it’s not careful.

But another use for blogging, and one that businesses might not even consider at first, is for internal communication. Although contractors can keep in contact via e-mail, meetings or conference calls, an internal blog can focus on a single project, providing a central place for a team to get continual updates or make an informal record of their progress. This could keep these contractors recent without their own e-mail mail box piling up to an unmanageable level.

Blogs weren’t the 1st tool in the social networking armoury, but once the Net actually became established and blogging software was created to make online interaction simpler, blogs became valuable tools to help a business exchange info and feedback with its customers. These web pages can supply up-to-date news, in a rather more permanent form than on other media, and keep the crucial lines of communication open.

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