PARTICIPATION BREEDS PASSION

While listening to and participating in the conversation can seem intimidating and sometimes overwhelming, the benefits of doing this are impossible to ignore. Beyond the value of simply getting customer feedback, you can create relationships with each and every one of your customers, which was impossible before the blog. Participating in this conversation offers several benefits:

• Creates customer evangelists.

•Builds trust among your entire customer base.

• Helps you become a thought leader in your industry.

• Lets you share and gain knowledge.

• Provides product feedback.

• Uncovers new growth opportunities and new markets.

In fact, the ways in which blogging benefits your business are limited only by the creative ways you can find to use blogging, be they through internal blogs that get your employees the information they need to know, external blogs that help you become a leader in your industry, or product-specific blogs that let your customers interact with you in a meaningful way. Whether an individual is a saboteur or an evangelist, every relationship you create and every time you step outside the boundaries of your company, you can create positive new experiences with each and every individual with whom you interact.

CREATING CUSTOMER EVANGELISTS

One of the most powerful benefits of blogging is that it helps you create evangelists. In their 2002 article, Creating Customer Evangelists, Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba tell us that passionate company evangelists can inform and empower your customers to carry your brand’s message to others.

Customer evangelists are powerful tools. When you give other customers the power to embrace your brand, they will take your brand’s message with them wherever they go, telling others about their experiences with your company and thereby extending your brand in a positive way that would not have otherwise been possible. Passionate messages can spread like wildfire; as soon as one passionate person enters a community, the dynamics of that community completely change. Most customers will become happy evangelists for your business and products if you provide enough positive experiences.

They need to love your company and your products, even if your products aren’t “perfect.” Creating passion isn’t about making people like you; it’s simply about using your passion to fuel more passion. The reality is that companies that create a stir, live on the edge, and try new ideas are going to be both loved and hated. And, just as in any relationship, sometimes you can’t be sure whether a customer is a true friend unless you listen to what he or she has to say. A blog is the perfect place for that.

BUILDING TRUST WITHIN YOUR CUSTOMER BASE

The best way to build trust is to be consistently trustworthy. Doctors earn trust after years of being fair, caring, professional, and knowledgeable. Similarly, your business builds trust with your customers in the real world by delivering on your promises. For example, if you promise to have the best prices but don’t, you are betraying your customers’ trust; if, however, you deliver on that promise consistently, customer trust increases as a natural result. Blogs are a great way to build trust, because they allow you a real person, and not some corporate marketing brochure to communicate with your customers, users, and community more regularly than any other medium allows. Ideally, your blog should attract at least one posting per day as a result, you have an opportunity to build trust by delivering on your promises daily.

BECOMING A THOUGHT-LEADER

Thought-leadership isn’t a new concept; it was proposed in the 1960s and finally given a name in the 1990s. The term refers to the ability to lead by proposing new and innovative ideas. The modernday application of thought-leadership with regard to business has been applied to companies that publish respected industry newsletters, participate in conferences (or host their own), and generally disseminate information in the hopes that more people will be exposed to the company and willing to invest in its products. The strong appeal of thought-leadership–based marketing makes a lot of sense, as becoming more visible relative to respected information ultimately means more interaction with customers and potential customers. The challenge for most companies engaging in a thought-leadership campaign is that it can be expensive. Maintaining newsletters, attending and speaking at conferences, and remaining publicly visible isn’t easy or cheap. Blogs provide a unique opportunity for thought-leadership in that they allow businesses to publish information people want in the way they want it. Add to that the ease of finding, subscribing, and contributing to blogs, and it’s obvious that blogs are one of WHY BLOG?

This question is an important one. Paul Chaney, a prominent blog consultant from Radiant Marketing Group, compiled this list of reasons why a business should blog:

• Search Engine Marketing Blogs give you an increased presence on major search engines like Google and Yahoo!.

• Direct Communications Blogs provide a way for you to speak directly and honestly with your customer.

• Brand Building Blogs serve as another channel to put your brand in front of the customer.

• Competitive Differentiation Because blogs give you the opportunity to tell your story over and over, they help set you apart from the competition.

• Relational Marketing Blogs allow you to build personal, long-lasting relationships with your customer that foster trust.

• Exploit the Niches Blogs help you fill your particular industry niche.

• Media & Public Relations Blogs are excellent PR tools. The media calls you, not your competition.

• Reputation Management Blogs enable you to manage your online reputation.

• Position You as Expert Blogs enable you to articulate your viewpoints, knowledge, and expertise on matters pertaining to your industry.

• Intranet & Project Management Blogs make great, easyto- use applications for internal communications within an organization.

This may be one of the least well-known and underutilized areas of blogs. the easiest ways to engage in a thought-leadership campaign. The challenge, of course, is that you still need to create material, research and comment on news, and generally discover and impart information of value as you would via any other medium. Most companies that are highly attuned to their industry are aware of these challenges and are already addressing them.

TRANSMITTING VS. ENGAGING

Most businesses and companies function in a “transmission” mindset. When they have a new product, they exhibit some kind of advertisement be it a sign in the window out front or a national television ad. They try and create buzz by displaying SALE ! in advertisements and in the window, in great big letters that are impossible to miss. The reality is that people don’t want to be talked at, they want to be talked with.

Companies around the world are beginning to realize that while transmission-based communication is an important part of getting out your message, far more effective tools are at their disposal. Dialogue is a powerful way to broadcast your message while simultaneously getting customer feedback. Before blogs, press releases were one of the best ways to communicate news about your company. You’d send the press release to a local paper or wire service, hope that some fraction of journalists would pick up on it, and then you’d gain some exposure for a fairly low cost.

The problem with press releases and similar transmissionstyle endeavors, though, is that after the press release leaves your company, you rarely see any return. Traditional response rates for transmission-based advertisements, such as television ads, radio campaigns, and press releases, is reported to be a measly 1 percent. At best, you might see an article or two in the news, though most likely it will just be a regurgitated piece from your press release. Or worse, you hear nothing at all. Tools such as blogs allow you to go beyond the press release and traditional media coverage. They help you engage with your customers and create a real dialogue.

These dialogue-based initiatives don’t replace press releases, advertising, or focus groups they compliment them. Consider Boeing, a leading aircraft and aerospace manufacturer, which began ramping up the production and marketing of its new plane, the 787 Dreamliner. The company used the traditional transmission-style marketing: press releases, launch parties, media tours, interviews with engineers, and the like. However, Boeing also allowed Randy Baseler, vice president of marketing, to blog (www.boeing.com/randy). Through his blog, Baseler was able to extend the message into a dialogue that included information about a Boeing competitor’s offering, the Airbus A380. Baseler responds to posts on other blogs, discusses what other blogs are talking about, and reads a vast cross-section of flight and aviation blogs. This blog allows Boeing to use a transmission-style message, which is great for getting the cold hard facts out to the world, as well as a personal dialogue, which is great for communicating passion, having a conversation, and listening to what customers and aviation enthusiasts think.