Does your business need a blog?

A blog is a Web log, an online journal. Blogs started out as online diaries, a form of revelatory writing in which diarists shared their everyday lives with the world. From their beginnings as a weird web fad in 1998, blogs have moved on, and are well on the way to becoming a standard business tool, often as content management systems and instant publishing tools.

In February 2003 Google.com bought Pyra Labs, the company which owns the Blogger weblogging tool and blogging began to take off. Blogger.com, one of the main sites providing blog software and hosting, boasted a million hosted web logs in early 2003, and now has tens of millions.

Blogs are mainstream. Many businesses are starting to see the value of a blog: instant communication with their customers, and for new businesses, and better Internet visibility with faster indexing in the main search engines, like Google.

A blog help your business in many ways, depending on whether you create a private or a public blog. Blogs are so useful that you'll want to create both.

=> Your business's private, internal blog

These days, no one works alone. Even if you're a solo business operator, you have colleagues --- partners, contractors, and suppliers with whom you communicate daily. A private blog makes working with a group easier, because you can streamline your interactions, saving time and energy.

A private blog can contain notes to yourself, or to colleagues. Its a place to store information and tips that might not warrant a special email message. You can post information like meeting notes, project tasks and summaries, and updated price lists. You can also post links to large files --- no need to email, fax, or mail them to and fro.

Your blog is more useful than email, because blog postings are dated, and easily searchable. You can post a message you want everyone to read, and the message stays on the blog. With email, you read and delete, or read and forget.

If you've worked on a project with someone in another state or on the other side of the world, you've blessed email, because it makes sharing information so easy. Using a blog to share information is even easier than using email.

=> Your business's public blog

A business blog is a marketing tool. A blog can add value to your Web site, or it can take the place of a Web site. Look on it as a combination "What's New" Web site page, and an online journal. Because of a blog's freewheeling nature, it's friendly and relaxed.

If you dont have a site, your blog's a place to put your online CV, portfolio and client list. You can, and should, use your blog to express your personality and expertise.

If you have a Web site, your blog page builds loyalty, because if you provide interesting content, your visitors will return to your site. And because it's a Web page, your blog will appear on search engines, attracting new clients.

Google has been treating blogs differently from other Web pages for a couple of years. Whereas it takes a standard Web page/ site a month to be indexed by Google, blogs are indexed daily. This means that your blog is mega-cheap advertising. You can post something on your blog and have it indexed by Google within a day.

Note: As of late 2005, Google is somewhat warier of new blogs, because of splogs (spam blogs), so it might take a few weeks for Google to index your new blog.

So go ahead, blog your business!