Three Steps To Take To Ensure You Never Lose Your Business Blog

As we as a world rely more and more on technology, there's no doubt that the benefits are substantial and generally speaking, setting up a business today is considerably easier than it was several decades ago.

One of the most useful resources that a business can use is a business blog, as blogs allow for a level of interaction between company and customer that isn't currently available through other mediums.

It's because of this reason why more and more organizations are looking at utilizing blogs to help develop their business and why many companies already have well established blogs with hundreds or thousands of posts.

Doing nothing but helping to develop your business, thinking of what might happen if you were to lose your blog for whatever reason really isn't worth contemplating, especially if it's a particularly well-established one and to ensure that you never lose your business blog, it's strongly advised that you put into place the following three steps.
Backup daily - whether you set your hosting to automatically backup daily or you use the services on your blog to manually backup at the end of each day, as long as you're ensuring that you have copies of your blog backed up to at least the last 24 hours, you should be able to be at ease knowing that you'll be able to get your blog back up and running almost immediately should something go awry.
Host on a different server to your website - if you have a business blog, it's almost taken as a given that you'll have a business website.
It could be particularly devastating if your website crashed and took a few days to be recovered and it could have a major impact if your blog was taken offline.
But think of the problems that could arise if you lost both at once.
Save yourself a lot of problems by hosting your blog and your website on different servers, as the likelihood of them then both being affected at the same time is greatly reduced.
Draft everything offline first - this may sound like a time consuming process, but you can guarantee that all of the content on your blog is safe and ready to be re-uploaded to your blog should it be damaged or corrupted in any way by drafting every piece of content that's going to be published on the blog offline first.
Whether you write it by hand, in a draft e-mail or a word processing document is irrelevant, the important point is you have another copy of every piece of content that's on your blog.

Simple and straightforward, by following these three steps, you can ensure you never lose your business blog.

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Article Submitted On: April 05, 2011

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Five Things You Need To Have Before You Start Blogging For Your Business

Blogging in the commercial sense has become extremely popular recent years and if carried out correctly, can be a particularly lucrative activity for any business.

The problem that a lot of businesses have, however, is that once they hear about the potential of a business blog, they rush into the process without any planning or preparation, something that will do nothing but mean you waste time that you really didn't have to - or time that could have been better spent elsewhere.

Therefore, to help those who are new to business blogging, the following five things are needed - or at least it would be strongly advised to have them - before you start blogging.

A website - the aim of a blog is to provide an area where a business can communicate with its customers, providing news and updates on everything from company news and new products.

Therefore, whilst in theory you can have a business blog without having a business website, it can be seen as somewhat of a pointless exercise, as you could be speaking to thousands of potential customers online, but without having the facility to direct them to a website where they can buy your products or services.

Knowledge of your market - something that you should have carried out to a certain extent prior to setting up your business, without a knowledge of your market, you're going to struggle to write blog posts that are going to be compelling and interesting, meaning it's going to be difficult to entice readers in.

Sure, you'll obviously what products they're after if they're buying yours, but do you know why they're buying these products? Do you know how long they use the products for? Do you know if they'd like more help or advice on the products?

It can take some time to fully understand your market, but when you do, you'll be able to produce content that's engaging and informative for them, something that all business blog posts should be.

Fluency and competency in your market's language - although it's highly likely that the audience you aim at primarily speak the same language as you do, it's important that if they don't, you do your utmost to learn that language to a fluent level before you start blogging, as writing in broken English, for example, doesn't portray a particularly professional image for your business.

What's more, it's advisable that unless you're competent in writing in an effective, professional way, you hire someone to do it for you.

It might only seem like a small point and it's easy to assume that if you can read and write English, for instance, you can write in a professional way, but the truth is that writing an e-mail to your friend is a completely different process to writing blog posts for your potential customers.

Some technical knowledge - whilst there are plenty of guides and instruction manuals available to help you set up your business blog and start blogging, it is strongly recommended that you have at least some technical knowledge before you move forward, as it will make the whole process that extra bit simpler.

Basic knowledge of an FTP client would be advisable, whilst knowing some standard HTML coding can always come in useful. And if you're reading this thinking it looks like a foreign language, type the phrases into a search engine and read up on them - they really aren't as difficult to understand as you might think.

Patience - when you hear reports of businesses seeing fantastic results from blogging, it can be extremely motivating and make you enthused to push your business's blog forward.

However, it can also have the negative effect and make you particularly frustrated when you didn't see the results you were hoping for within a few weeks. Just like any new project, it can take a substantial length of time for it to get off the ground and although you should see some results within a few weeks from regular business blogging, don't be surprised if it takes a several months for you to start seeing the results that are similar to what you were hoping for.

A business blog is something that every single business around the world can utilize and benefit from. Whilst they are relatively easy to set up, they can be difficult to use effectively if you don't have a plan and it's for this reason why it's strongly recommended you've got the appropriate aspects in place before you start, so to ensure the maximum return on your investment.

 

10 Things a Blog Will Do For Your Internet Business

When a static site goes up, it may attract search engine interest initially. But unless you change content on it frequently, it will grow "stale." A blog complements the goals of website owners who are best served by a static website. Professionals in the medical field, contractors, and service providers often fall into this group. It's okay to build a static site, but you need to think of ways to keep your message fresh.

1) A blog adds the new content search engines like.

Search engines thrive on unique, original content, and blogs are the easiest way to add content to your site without having to know anything about html. Plug-ins like WordPress simplify the process of adding content to your site. All you need to learn is how to use the blog interface. Coding occurs in the background.

2) Each blog post affects the accumulated PageRank of your website.

The Google algorithm may increase your PageRank as you add pages to your website, or it may decrease PageRank. The way a blog prevents this is simple. It encourages backlinks to your site. It is also an opportunity for you to link to specific pages in your website that offer the service or product discussed in your blog. Those internal links are also helpful for PageRank.

3) Your blogs expand your ability to target keywords naturally.

A blog title can target specific long-tail keyword phrases. You can only focus on a few keywords on each page of your website. You don't face this limitation as you add blogs.

4) Your blog establishes you as a unique voice within your niche.

Your blog helps you establish brand. Every one of us has a unique way of approaching the world. Having a blog is an opportunity to present a unique understanding of your particular niche.

5) Your blog can position you as an industry expert.

It can take time, but blogging within your industry or niche is a powerful tool in positioning yourself as someone who truly understands your field. Not only can a blog establish you as a unique voice. It can establish you as one of the leading experts in your field.

6) Blog posts may appear in search results.

Because your blog titles may match a search very closely, your blogs may appear in search results. If your post delivers on what the title promised, you may develop a loyal following. You may also bring prospects into your sales funnel.

7) Blogs can compete with article marketing.

Many article sites require a minimum of 400 words. Your blog can be far shorter and still act as a marketing tool.

Your blog gives you a place where you can publish brief announcements about different things going on with your business. You aren't limited by Twitter's 140 character limit, though you can tweet your post using Twitters url shortener. But you aren't facing 400 words either.

8) Blogs can be leveraged in social media.

Twitter has become its own search engine, so tweet your blog using the hashtag symbol # followed by keywords. For example, if your blog is on SEO, use #SEO in your tweet.

You can also use your blog to grow your social media connections through invitations to follow your business on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.

9) Blogs build community.

Because a blog is often niche oriented, adding a business blog where you engage with existing and potential customers builds relationships. People feel like they are getting to know you, even if they know they will never meet you in person.

If your blog also engages fellow experts in your genre, it accomplishes several goals at once. It helps to build connections. It confirms your expertise within your genre. And it creates the opportunity for you to learn things you've overlooked.

A blog is a virtual networking opportunity. That's another opportunity to strengthen and grow your business.

10) A blog that starts attracting a lot of traffic could become a source of income.

Google AdWords is a common option. You've probably seen Google ads at the top of some blogs you have visited. As long as these aren't placed where they become an irritating obstruction to reading your blog, they can bring passive income into your business.

PayPerPost (PPP) is another type of blog marketing strategy where you can register your blog, letting advertisers know you are interested in writing posts for that genre. The advertiser and you negotiate a price and then you submit your blog posts to the advertiser. Payment is handled via PayPal.