I’ve been thinking a lot lately on email marketing and Web 2.0 marketing for small businesses. By small, I mean a wide range from hyper small, like mom-and-pop shops, up to mid-size companies. The reason I’ve been (let’s use a more accurate word here) dwelling on the topic is two-fold:
First off, I see far too many small- to mid-size businesses doing a poor job at email marketing.
Second, I see far too many of these same businesses not taking advantage of Web 2.0 marketing.
In the first case, I blame the ease of email. Email marketing is easy to do, and therefore easy to do wrong. Despite all the talk about segmentation and relevance and one-to-one marketing, most of the calls I get as a copywriter and marketing consultant are from businesses doing batch and blast email. Or they’re not using email at all. Not sure yet which is worse…
Regarding Web 2.0, there’s one incredibly easy way for these businesses to take advantage of Web 2.0 marketing that has nothing to do with podcasting or Facebook or Twitter. And even though it’s easy to do, unlike email marketing, it’s easy to get it right.
I’m talking about blogging for small business. Blogging is one Web 2.0 marketing tool that business owners can put to work right now, today. Seriously, if you’re a small business owner reading this blog, you could be writing your own blog within the next 30 minutes depending on which platform you choose. Ditto for the marketer for the mid-size company reading this blog: your company should be jumping on the blogging bandwagon too.
That said, the whole idea of blogging for business stymies most clients I mention it to. OK, it stymies all of them, I admit it. That’s why I started making up a guide for getting going. It’s still pretty rough right now, although I’ve given it out to a few people, but if you’re thinking about blogging as a marketing tool and you’d like to see it, email me at sharon@weknowwords.com.
If you’re not thinking about blogging as a marketing tool, definitely email me at sharon@weknowwords.combecause we need to talk!
Posted by: Brent Allan - The Bizwarrior on Saturday, May 24, 2008
I agree that everyone should be blogging. Although I disagree that it is easy to get right. Actually blogging can be fairly easy, but coming up with relevant content that attracts readers and subscribers is not easy. Of course, your start up guide may give some info on how to do just that, which would make it a valuable resource.