Mark, any advice on how to generate business via blog? Is there anything I should pay special attention to? Many thanks in advance.

On this topic, I really thought this was a great post:

http://hunternuttall.com/blog/2008/01/consider-having-a-blog-no-matter-who-you-are/

You’ve taught me an awful lot, but this post resonates with me! I can very easily (as you know!) go off on a tangent.

Luckily, you’ve givne me the odd dig when needed to get back on topic, and it’s paying off handsomely.

We support a number of small businesses, and so far I’ve not seen any of them use a blog.

While many people are initially attracted because of it’s marketing value, they have so many more applications.

I particularly use them with existing clients to educate and inform. When used in tandem with a short email and link to the article, the readership levels are really good.

As time goes on, this investment is starting to pay off. Rather than have to sell to clients, it kind of changes the emphasis to them buying from you if that makes sense?

As you know, the blog you helped us design is beginning to generate sales from new client too, but I fully expect it will help as a marketing tool to existing clients as time goes on.

Our situation is slightly different from many others. Because we offer small business IT support, we actually need them to buy and invest in some stuff to help them stay secure or minimise down-time.

Unfortunately, there are still a few people out there who think you make money on hardware. You don’t.

But you still need them to buy it.

So our blog is already helping us keep on track by giving us a forum through which we can talk in an informative/educational way explaining the background to a particular product most people need.

And in so doing, it’s helping us get the sales we need for them rather than us. Our goal is to minimise support calls and the blog is beginning now after a few months to deliver that as well as new clients.

General impressions are that it most certainly does and it’s definitely something that I recommend people consider, not only for larger retail e-commerce sites but also smaller companies where they have a set of product images and short descriptions but nothing that search engines or their potential customers can really get their teeth into.

I’m writing a post at the moment on this very subject which will cover some of the benefits (and pitfalls!). I will see what my research pulls up in terms of specifics annd let you know.

My decision was to start a new blog, The Blog Coach, but unfortunately that coincided with a new arrival in the family and I found I couldn’t maintain both with the right quality of content so reverted back to BBB with a mix of content that I hope appeals across the board.

My advice: if you can dedicate the time to a new blog with all that entails to do it properly, then that will probably be the cleanest way. If not, then create a new major category in your current blog, and visibly split in display/format terms the content that you post there as a clear subset of your overall blog. You can set up a specific RSS feed for it even separate styling if you want.

Whichever way you decide, let me know and good luck!

I’d like to see some research to understand whether adding a blog to an e-commerce website actually generates increased loyalty, stickiness – and of course, transactions.

Then, I read blogs such as this one and James Brausch (marketing), who keep their blogs clean, minimal, and on-topic.

I’m not sure if I should try and “steer” my blog differently, or if I should just start over with a new blog.