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Loading ...I was invited to attend a small business blogger roundtable a few years ago sponsored by Brother – you know the company that makes the P-Touch, the sewing machines, the printers and is plastered all over Project Runway.
In addition to myself, there was Steven Strauss from USA Today, Gene Marks, Jay Heyman, Peter Piazza, Yvonne DiVita and Carmina Perez. We spent an enjoyable two hours over a lunch to discuss Who Says a Slow Economy Has to Slow Your Small Business Down?
Gene Marks took issue with most of us saying, “Look I don’t think every business owner in a strip center like a deli or the guy who owns a gas station needs a website or needs to blog.” He went on to make his point that it shouldn’t surprise any of us why they don’t. “There’s no need.”
The better part of the next twenty minutes I found myself obsessing on a gas station and why they should blog. It hit me and I asked Gene, “Do you think if the gas station owner put up a 4′x4′ sign at the end of his (or her) pumps that said, ‘Visit my blog at http://gassipper.wordpress.com to find out ways you can save on gas,’ that people’d be interested?”
Gene’s eyes opened wide – he saw the possibilities now too. That’s the excitement of sharing ideas in person!
Open transparent communication between you and your customers. The power of blogs is they are invitational – people who want to find out about you or your category search you out. They come to you.
Contrast that to traditional advertising where we shoot cannons out into the public hoping to hit someone.
You don’t have to know everything about blogging but try searching the internet for what you might be interested in, just put the word “blog” in the search too. You’ll be amazed at all the interesting and fresh information out there.
Comment on a few if you like, either agree or disagree but be respectful. Put your own website into your response so people can find you.
You’ll be amazed at how this trend is growing. And if you have a website? The more incoming links from various servers people come onto your site from – the higher your Google ranking becomes.
So what do you have to lose? I don’t think this “Internet” thing is going to go away.
For more about blogging, checkout The Retail Doctor’s Guide to Growing Your Business (Wiley.)
I have a client ( I also do some Internet Marketing) who owns a temporary fence and portable toilet business in the San Francisco Bay Area – about as exciting as a gas station.
Within two months of putting his blog up he was buried with new business – 4 to 6 new clients a day.
There is an incredible opportunity for business owners in “non-sexy” businesses to dominate the search engines in their niche markets.
Great story John! The challenge for most of us is to embrace the power of these new media and leave behind the yellow pages ads, discount coupons, etc where you could just write a check and it would be done.
Blogs certainly take more time but you could hire a college student for a few hours a week to help you make it fresh and interesting.
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