Just like you, I hate being marketed to. Every day we’re bombarded with over 3,500 marketing messages. (That’s an old stat from about 3 years ago…no doubt it’s at least tripled by now.) And frankly I’m sick of it! But blogs are different. Blogs are a two-way conversation between blogger and bloggee (plus all the readers in between). Through commenting and cross-linking, you can share feedback. You can build your network. You can become, dare I say it, an Internet celebrity!

See blogs add humanity and instantaneous expression to the web. Like ezines, blogs are a way for your customer to get to know you.

However, unlike ezines, blogs help you with search engine rankings. Did you hear me? I said, unlike ezines, blogs help you with search engine rankings. That’s a big one.

Entrepreneur Magazine, Business Week, even the FCC (Federal Trade Commission) all believe blogs are here to stay. Recently Michael Powell, chairman of the FCC, started one. His initial post drew over 30,000 readers. And filmmakers are using blogs too. Michael Moore built a blog to promote his controversial movie, Fahrenheit 9/11. As did makers of the hit movie, The Dark Knight.

But who has time to read a blog anyway? Exactly! The job of a blog is to cut through the information overload and deliver searchable, relevant and current content. BlogAds.com recently conducted a survey of over 17,000 blog readers. Here’s what they report:

Blog readers are older and more affluent. 61% of blog readers are over 30, and 75% make more than $45,000 a year.

Blog readers are more cyber-active. 54% of their news consumption is online. 21% are themselves bloggers and 46% describe themselves as opinion makers.

Blog readers are media-mavens. 21% subscribe to the New Yorker magazine, 15% to the Economist, 15% to Newsweek and 14% to the Atlantic Monthly.

Whether on the left or right, blog readers have traits in common that often are absent in today’s public spaces: passion and initiative.

Blog readers have apathy towards traditional news sources. 82% say that television is worthless. 55% percent say the same about print newspapers. 54% say the same about print magazines.

Meanwhile, 86% say that blogs are either useful or extremely useful as sources of news or opinion. 80% say they read blogs for news they can’t find elsewhere. 78% read because the perspective is better. 66% value the faster news. 61% say that blogs are more honest.
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readers appear united in their dissatisfaction with conventional media and their rabid love of blogs.

Don’t you want to be a blogger too? How about looking at some samples of the good, the bad and the bizarre?

Model citizen blogs: http://vivavisibilityblog.com – Nancy Marmolejo is a genius at using social networking for maximum visibility.

http://www.income.com/blog - John Reese’s blog. Hey, the guy just made $1,080,496.37 online in a single day. Here’s a good rule of thumb. If Reese is doing it, you should be too.

http://www.michaelport.com/blog - Michael Port’s blog does a great job of cross-promoting his products while providing useful content.

http://www.theroadtofabulous.com – Sandy Grason’s ‘Road to Fabulous’ uses photos and video to bring her stuff to life and make us envy her.

Bizarro Blog: Jeff Bridges’ site is considered a “blog.” It’s hand-written! (Yes, really). http://www.jeffbridges.com

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 28th, 2008 at 3:15 pm and is filed under Blogging Tips, Copywriting Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.