About a month ago I really discovered the value of blogs. Until that point, I had assumed that blogs were places where people could record their random thoughts and enjoy the ability to publicly express themselves. Blogging had become so easy, that anyone could do it, and therefore I had concluded that blog quality must be low.
But then I began to discover some very intelligent, informative, and useful blogs. These blogs were obviously well thought out, and focused on specific topics. The people behind the blogs were very impressive, and I found myself checking their blogs frequently so that I could immediately read their new material.
And then I discovered RSS feeds. Actually, I discovered Netvibes through one of the blogs that I was reading, and fell in love. What a fabulous tool, and I realized that subscribing to feeds was as easy as copy-and-paste. I set up my Netvibes account and now I always keep it open and refer to it often, checking up on my favorite blogs.
So blogs are interesting and helpful – nice, but why not just continue reading them, and leave my site as is? Because bloggers are a very persuasive bunch, and I kept reading over and over how blogging enriches your site’s content, and consequently increases traffic to your site. Some people even went so far as to claim that simply having a blog is sufficient for your business.
I had trouble swallowing the idea that a blog is enough for a business – I believe that people still want certain specific information about businesses that is not typically found on blogs, such as clients, testimonials, services, portfolio etc. I decided to try to create some kind of combination business site/blog.
I also moved towards blogs because the age of the static site is over. Web sites are about fresh content that frequently changes, drawing new and repeat visitors. My previous site was effectively fulfilling its purpose, which was to make my business look more professional, and give visitors the information they generally wanted about me. However, even with my web skills and Dreamweaver set up and ready to FTP, I generally hesitated to update my site because it still seemed too time consuming.
In business, we are always trying to improve – we aim to improve customer service, our products, and our marketing. So if I already have some kind of web presence, why not try to improve it and gain more from it?
And finally, the last consideration was the opportunity to spill my thoughts into a medium where others would actually read. I love to write, but I rarely get the chance to do so because I can’t find the time. If I can excuse my writing as an important part of developing my business, I can write and avoid feeling guilty.
I know that you can’t start a blog and only post new content once a month – frequency is key to success. So will I be able to keep up with the demands of blogging? And if so, will I find that results from my site will have improved? And is blogging in Israel as effective as in other parts of the world. Stay tuned…