BBS 05: Building Traffic: Posting isn't Enough!

January 24, 2005 at 12:14 PM

Blog Business Summit notes from Molly Holzschlag's session on Building Traffic: Posting isn't Enough!

This will not be so much about the money in blogging but its about getting users to your sites. Cotnent is king, is content what really matters? You can have great content on your blog that may never be seen or read unless you able to drive people to your blog. A blog is regularly updated, and that can mean many things (scoble, me, etc). Just because you set it up and write the content, doesn't mean people are going to find it. This isn't just SEO and that stuff. There are some tools and techniques built right into blogging software that can help you get there.

Knowing your intent
First; define your goals. These are important issues before you even get into blogging. Without a well defined goal it is possible to fail miserably. What is the end intention of your business blog (make money, promote products, etc.). If your going into business with your blog have a business plan. Find out who you competitors are, what is out there, just like you would with a traditional business.

Know thy audience. Know who your blog is for. Know the demographics. Review server logos see who is coming and from where, do the analysis. Spend some time blue-skying, where you want to be in a year or two years. I really encourage you to do this research before you just step out there. We're not talking about personal blogs here, for a business you need to have a plan. You need to know who you are working with and for.

First know, then go
The next step is to choose the best software for your needs (see later session with me and DL Byron). Make sure your brand is very apparent in your website and content. It's really important for a professional blog to not rely on template designs. Make sure you are using real designs created from scratch. We want to maintain our brand, our logos, our colors throughout our blog and not rely on templateed solutions. Make sure you can post regularly. Figure out your posting schedule. If you don't have the ability to commit to a schedule, don't commit to it then. A deal blog has a negative connotation. Your blog will die without regular content, period. Do your research, early intent, and direction and planning.

The blog tool holy trinity
The three things that will potentially help you in getting the information out to your people, and keep people coming back:

Comment systems
Trackback/pingback
Aggregation (RSS/ATOM)

This session was much more on topic and it was clear Molly is a well tuned craftswoman when it comes to giving presentations and offering practical advice.