How many times have you answered a question for an employee that seems like you’ve heard a dozen times before? Very often the reason you feel that way is because it’s true! An internal business blog can help you solve many of these situations once and for all.

It helps overcome three inconveniences when it comes to disseminating important company info internally:

1. Accessing your operations manual online through your intranet, which is not exactly user friendly.

2. Referring to an offline version in hardcopy form, which is cumbersome for your team members (and may be providing potentially outdated information too.)

3. Relying on you or your top managers to answer questions, which may not give your team the answers they need as quickly as they need.

A business blog set up to act internally as a centralized knowledge base is less intimidating and much more user friendly than any of these choices.

As your team becomes accustomed to accessing the knowledge they need from this internal blog, they win with nearly instant access to the info they need to perform. And you win with more free time because now you only have to answer questions and provide guiding knowledge once.

In an earlier application example we looked at how you can use your business blog externally as a product development tool. In that case you’d use the blog to organize your product creation into bite size pieces while you allow your prospects and clients to benefit from the content you’re creating as part of the development.

The internal application of this application would work basically the same way, only your posts and content would be password protected or for private/internal viewing only. In this capacity your business blog could act even more openly as a product content management tool.

This application works equally well for a team, as it would for you as a single developer. With the right set-up, the blog will provide the structure, content relationships, and linkage to reference materials – all in one place, and completely organized for easy access.

For many companies, industry and competitive research is essential for rapid growth and niche leadership. When multiple parties become involved in research (both directly and indirectly) things can start to get pretty confusing. Information is filed and archived, most of the time – never to be seen again.

With a private password protected business blog all that research can be categorized and made readily available for convenient access. You can provide one central location where information can be easily accessed for immediate use. No more double work, and no more “buried” files.

Creating a product (a book, a course, an audio series) is something that can supercharge the marketing of just about any small business. Many small business owners know this is true but yet they still struggle for months (and often for years) to finally wring that product out. It’s a challenge that many busy business owners face, but here’s where a specially designed business blog can come to your rescue.

One very practical way to use your business blog is to use it to create a product online in a “piece-meal” fashion. We’ve shown many of our coaching clients how to leverage this new technology and put it to use in creating their long delayed book or product.

With some forethought and focused planning you can use this type of business blog to simultaneously accomplish three marketing benefits too.

You’ll …

a. Feed a continuous stream of valuable relevant material to your target market

b. Create a captive audience of pre-qualified buyers ready to purchase when your product is done

c. Organically generate a ton of keyword rich content for search engine spiders

Best of all, you can keep yourself organized while you create your product bit-by-bit right in front of your competitor’s eyes. Since only you know how all your content will link together to form a product — they’ll never know what you’re doing. You can post most material for public view with confidence.

When you have content where it’s questionable that you’d want it open to public view, or if you have some proprietary data or research to be included in your product — you can still use your business blog to stay organized. With the better blog software programs (such as Word press,) you can keep that content password protected while still using the structure of your business blog to keep you focused and organized.

With the right approach, your business blog will be like a treasure map. A map that leads to a completed product over time and a map that no one else can decipher. With no clear beginning or end, it translates into a product “in-progress” cloaked to everyone but you.

You’ve probably heard the saying “and inch wide and a mile deep” to describe an area of specialty for your business. But that same principle can also be applied to the branding of your product or service.

It can take years to brand your company using an offline only approach. Even when you employ some serious online strategies and tactic, brand building can be a long drawn out process.

But with a business blog, you can often achieve the same focused impact in a matter of months! And the great thing is it doesn’t matter whether your clients buy primarily online or offline. Building a niche brand with your business blog is a remarkably effective approach.

Blogs leverage the power of word of mouth and kick your niche branding into high gear.

Put a business blog to work for you and you’ll witness the power of word of mouth. When you combine the publication of high impact articles in targeted publications with interactive events (both on-line and off-line) — you can create the buzz and branding you’re searching for in a fraction of the time, and for practically no cost what-so-ever. The press notices more quickly, and your target market responds more quickly.

Once again, your business blog is not “the” answer all on it’s own. But it’s a powerful multiplier for a solid click-and-mortar business branding strategy.

Successful marketing is no longer about being outrageous or screaming louder than your competitors. In the 21st Century marketplace people want a relationship with the person (or people) they’re buying from. That relationship is what makes the consumer feel confident that he or she will get the personalized service they’re looking for.

When you decide to create a business blog, with all it’s ease of use and built in interactivity, you’re taking advantage of the perfect medium for effective “new school” marketing. It’s marketing that’s based on building deeper levels of trust, understanding, and rapport.

Really when you think about it, this desire on the part of consumers should come as no surprise. It’s nothing new.

Most people have always wanted an interactive relationship with the provider of services or products they need. But during the last century the merchant has been in control. And unfortunately that “old school” business owner didn’t understand the important distinction between making a sale and building a relationship.

Successful marketing in the marketplace of the new millennium

The 21st Century Marketplace is a new and rapidly evolving environment. If you hope to be effective with your marketing in the future, now’s the time to wake up and ride the wave of change.

Technology, the Internet, and now blogs — they’ve all permenantly changed the expectations of the average consumer. No longer will obtrusive ads or other interruption marketing techniques create the results you once could count on.

Today’s consumer is bombarded with blatant marketing messages and overwhelmed with the shear volume of clutter in their lives. Joining in the frey and just trying to shout above all the other noise is not enough anymore. You need to stand out by stepping out of the traditional marketing paradigm.

People who are in your target audience want to be educated about your product or service. They want to feel comfortable with you and your company before making a commitment to purchase from you.

Using your business blog to share detailed information about the benefits, applications, and implications of your product or service can help you achieve all the goals you want and more. Educating through your business blog and speaking about other issues directly related to your niche or industry will transform you (in the eyes of your audience) into a trusted resource instead of a self-serving marketer.

Like it or not — interruption marketing is dead

Some business owners may feel like all this education, orientation, and interaction is way too much work. “I’ll just pump some more money into an ad campaign and get the same results I always have,” some owners may ignorantly say. But any business owner who thinks this way is in for a rude awakening.

I can assure you, the direction the 21st Century marketplace is moving is undeniable. The consumer is in control, and that will only be reinforced as time goes on. The unstoppable upswing in technological advances and integration of the internet more and more into our daily lives makes sticking with the old methods of interruption marketing a literal death wish.

Today’s consumer is well armed with convenient technology and she’s internet-savvy. She already knows she get information on just about anything she wants. The easier you make it for people in your target audience to find the information they’re already looking for — the more they’ll appreciate you and your willingness to educate them.

This is all GOOD NEWS for the average small business owner

All these changes in the marketplace have dramatically leveled the playing field. It’s no longer the big that eat the small. It’s now the fast that eat the slow! That means successful marketing is now more about getting the right information rapidly applied than it is about big bucks and complex campaigns.

A properly planned business blog is part of the answer. I can assure you there is no easier way to winning the trust of prospects and making them feel secure in making an initial purchase. It’s interactive, easy to integrate into your existing marketing strategy, and best of all — it’s ultra low cost.

Learning how to create your own business blog is not the complete answer all on it’s own. But as part of an overall click-and-mortar marketing strategy it’s an interactive tool that you and your business cannot survive without. Step into the marketplace of the new millennium with confidence and integrate a business blog into your marketing strategy today.

When it comes to building credibility and gaining recognition as a knowledgable expert your marketing materials, web site, and even the occasional published article do little to establish you as a leader in your niche. Unless you have a full feature article published in a major national magazine or you have a regular weekly column in a major paper, it’s difficult to generate the respect and notoriety that press coverage can bestow.

But when you create a niche-focused business blog you can quickly gain recognition and respect while proving yourself with quality result-generating content. It’s amazing but true — you can post to your business blog for as little as two or three months and you’ll begin to establish substantial credibility in your market.

Using your business blog in this way has a number of benefits, but one of the most powerful is building a credible track record that speaks for itself. When a prospect arrives at your blog and sees how much knowledge you’re sharing and the passion you’re exhibiting about your chosen niche – people respond to that. And that response is usually to place you in a position of respect and expertise.

Get educated on the right way to start your own business blog, then follow a well-planned strategy. When you do, your RSS powered blog can become a major ally in your reaching for a position of recognition and respect in your industry or niche.

Business blogging is not a magic wand, but it is a powerful communication tool that can transform you into a serious “go-to” source of knowledge.

Many times your prospects and clients are dying to know in detail how your product or service can help them. Very often in your websites sales copy it’s difficult to make the connection between benefits and the practical ways your product or service can be used. Your business blog can create the bridge you need to lead a curious prospect over the valley of trust to become a loyal client and raving fan.

Sharing real-life case studies in your business blog does two things.

1. It makes the benefits of your product or service tangible.
2. And it subtly creates social proof (Definition) that opens the door to deeper rapport.

You can devote your entire business blog to case studies, or just dedicate a section. But when you do, you’ll realize a significant increase in trust and rapport because people can interact with you by commenting on your case studies. Something that they could never easily do with a regular web site.

Software companies, programmers, and web designers can use a business blog to keep their clients up to date with the latest upgrades and fixes.

By creating a business blog with this purpose you can put your clients minds at ease knowing that solutions and upgrades are being worked on. And if your current work is not addressing an issue that one of your clients is aware of, you’re more likely to get feedback on other bugs or problems you should be looking into.

If your business or industry focuses on photos or visual imagery, then a business blog can be a big help too. Business blogs can be used for the rapid posting and wide distribution of visual content as well as text.

The only key with image-based blogs is that a text summary and alt image text is a must for each and every post. That helps humans make the linkage between the images and the benefit to them. And that helps the search engine spiders, because photos mean nothing to a Search Engine spider.