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Article

6 Ways That Blogging Can Save You Money

Copyright 2005 Tinu AbayomiPaul

Even though I've had several personal blogs for years, I've
only been officially business blogging since 2003. So in
going back over expenses for the last quarter, you can
imagine my shock when I realized that my overall business
costs were down about 19%. What saved me so much money? 
Surprisingly, blogging. 

How can you save money with your blog? It's pretty simple,
so I'll be brief. 

Attract search engine traffic without paying the big bucks

If you want Google, Yahoo and MSN to pay attention to you,
blog. 

It doesn't have to be a whole new site, just add a
directory to your existing site and start blogging. Most
blog software solutions are either cheap or free. 

And you can find out most basic blog information online for
free (really, sometimes just typing your question into
Google will do it.) by people who've actually done it. For
less than $100, you can build a small library of blog tips
and secrets, written by successful business bloggers. 

Instead of buying links, get one-way links from blog search
engines and directories, as well as getting your RSS feed
content displayed at other sites. 

Linking is a great way to get search engine attention and
click traffic. Some people get links by trading; others by
including their links at the end of freely distributed
articles. Others pay to be listed, or to get linked. 

In each of these scenarios, some type of trade takes place,
money, free content, or a link back. 

When you blog, you'll find plenty of search engines and
directories that are willing to list you free of charge.
For the most part you won't need to link back - you'll get
a one-way link from site favored by search engines, often
using text that you select yourself. 

If 90 or more of these free, legitimate links back to your
site is worth your time, then get you blog in motion. 

Not only that, if you update frequently, other sites may
want to display your RSS feed content on their sites. To
encourage them to do so, put a link on your page with
instructions on how to do so. Ever since I put one on the
front of my site, various feeds from my main site have
turned up in the most unexpected places.

Cheaper way to study your audience. 

As your blog gets more popular, you may start to find that
on any given day, you have a representative cross-section
of prospects and clients at your site. If you have a
question for them, you can just... ask. 

True, you can post a link to a survey in your newsletter or
on your site, but these are not as interactive as the
ability for your audience to comment. They will comment,
and you can reply to ask them to expand, or clarify.
Conversation gets going and before you know it, a bond is
formed, a much stronger bond than occurs in a one-way
conversation.

Cheaper (and faster) way to start a resource or authority
site. 

Five years ago, if you wanted to start an authority site,
your best bet was to build a portal with a specialized
directory at its core. Three years ago, you were better off
starting a forum with a resource section attached to it.
Last year, your top bet was a feed-enabled content
management system, especially as more parts of content
management systems began to have content feeds related to
them. (I have 12 feeds for each of my PHP-Nuke based sites,
though they don't work as well with Google Tap.)

Now, if you want to be the expert, you want to start a
blog. 

If you're blogging consistently, you have a hub of
information collected that will inspire return traffic. You
have a collection of links to articles, sites, and tools.
You can constantly write up your own opinion editorials on
each of these items, as well as fact-based analysis of news
and events that can help your audience make better choices. 

As blog software matures you can now categorize, and
alphabetize your links, and with the ability to ping
multiple sources as well as leave trackback links to other
sites, you can send your readers through a ring of related,
freshly updated information that ultimately leads back to
you.

Spend less money on advertising as your blog becomes more
popular

I can't promise you that you'll never spend another red
cent on advertising costs. However, the amount of free
advertising you get from having your blog link or RSS feed
listed in dozens of search engines and directories, and
popping up in feed readers is not to be underestimated. 

You'll probably still want to do some ezine advertising
when your new ebook or software release is debuted. But you
may not need to buy as much advertising or purchase as
often.

Then there is the fact that many newsletters that are also
published to RSS feeds have wider reach. I've found that
it's worth the extra money to appear in both versions - ask
your favorite publisher for details. For publications that
allow this, it's normally only 20% extra

Save money by retaining visitors

You've probably heard a thousand times that it is easier to
sell repeatedly to an existing client than it is to find a
new one. So how do you get that visitor to come back, and
possibly buy again?

A constant stream of new information on a particular topic
work is enough to keep people buying a daily newspaper,
subscribing to a magazine or viewing a television series.

Frequent updates can work the same way for your site.

With bloggers being named People of the Year by Time
magazine last year, if you're not blogging in 2005, you're
going to be left in the dust by other sites in your
industry that do. It doesn't have to take up a lot of extra
time, and the time it does takes is made up for in the
money you can save.


About the Author:

Read more about how a blog can help you get spidered by
search engines within 24 hours at
http://www.freetraffictip.com/gbc .