Blogs Hunger for Your Brand
A great place to build your brand is through blogs. Many bloggers actually want to talk about your brand.They gladly display advertising for your brand. They hunger for news about your brand.
How do I know that? It’s all profiled in the recent 2008 State of the Blogosphere Report by Technorati.com, the blog tracking service.
Each year Technorati writes a State of the Blogosphere Report. http://technorati.com/blogging/state-of-the-blogosphere/   For the first time in 2008 the State of the Blogosphere Report addresses the subject of brands.  It’s a gold mine of information. So let’s dive in and see what it tells us.
Bloggers Talk About Brands Frequently
Bloggers talk about companies’ brands all the time. Brands now play a major part in bloggers’ online conversations, as several of the Report’s findings note:
- More than 80% of bloggers post product or brand reviews, and write about brands they love or hate. Even day-to-day experiences with customer care or in a retail store are fodder for blog posts.
- 37% of bloggers post product reviews or brand reviews “frequentlyâ€
- Companies today are reaching out to bloggers: one-third of bloggers have been approached to be brand advocates.
- The majority of bloggers now accept and display advertising on their blogs.
Blogs Have Become Credible and Influential Sources
Perceptions about blogs have shifted since the early years of blogging. If you had this picture in your mind of nut wings blogging in their pajamas in their parents’ basements repeating tinfoil-hat conspiracy theories, you are missing what’s happening with blogs. Simply put, blogs have come to be seen as credible, influential sources – so much so that today, bloggers look primarily to other blogs for their information, instead of to the mainstream media:
- 71% of bloggers believe that blogs are getting taken more seriously as sources of information. Blogs are getting accepted.
- 49% believe blogs are just as valid media sources as traditional media! Let that sink in a moment: almost half of bloggers believe that reading something on another blog is just as valid as reading it in, say, your local newspaper.
- 61% say that blogs have advertising and content that entice them to learn more about products and services. In fact, among bloggers, blogs are the #1 most influential source of information about brands – more so than mainstream media in print or on TV.
5 Take-Aways
I suggest there are 5 key take-aways from the State of the Blogosphere Report 2008 for small businesses when it comes to your brand-building efforts:
(1) Bloggers find it a natural thing to discuss brands on their blogs if those brands capture their attention in some way, good or bad (hopefully in your case all good). So don’t hold back from reaching out to bloggers. Blogs are now accepted places for reviewing a product, introducing a new product or service, or announcing a new marketing initiative. Blogs also welcome advertising messages highlighting your products and services, with the majority of bloggers now displaying ads on their sites.
(2) Blogs are credible sources of news and information. In other words, being seen on a blog can be as valid as being seen in mainstream media – more informal perhaps, but valid. It’s no wonder that many large corporations today proudly recognize product-reviews by blogs among their press mentions on their websites. Large corporations welcome – they seek out – mentions on blogs. Why not take a page out of their book?
(3) Bloggers are most open to receiving marketing messages from other blogs. If you want to reach the millions of bloggers (or just that segment of your market which blogs) the best place to do that is to be seen on blogs. Blogs are the medium where most bloggers get their information today. In fact, other blogs are the primary place where other bloggers look to get information about products and brands today.
(4) Bloggers as a group are educated and affluent. Bloggers are a good target market. The Report found that 75% of U.S. bloggers are college graduates, and 42% have attended graduate school. They skew male, and more than half have a household income over $75,000. Hmmm, education and money to spend – sounds to me like a good combination for marketing purposes.
(5)  Your competitors are being seen on blogs. With so many bloggers having been targeted by companies to become brand advocates, in all likelihood that means your competitors are already reaching out to, or advertising in, blogs. Unless you too are there, you could be at a competitive disadvantage.Â
Â
* * * * *
So, definitely consider blogs a fertile ground for building brand awareness and visibility. The blogosphere is ready for you — in some ways hungers to hear from you and your brand.
Loading ...
Wow, this is terrific info. Thanks!
I can definitely relate to this article because this is exactly how I use my own blog. I enjoy finding products and businesses with unique offerings to discuss. I think companies with products that bloggers discuss should be flattered. Most of the time, we are bringing positive attention to your products.
I also rely on blogger opinions before I make a rather large purchase on an item for myself. The first thing I do, is search online for reviews. Personal opinions matter to me and I’m glad that we have the opportunity to find info online now.
I can only hope that this Golden Age of blogging lasts for more than a few months – before corporate shills pollute the blogosphere with their own faux-democratic journalism, and choke decent blogs with interruptive advertising. To me, a good blog puts its advertising in its own right-side column. Keep it relevant and keep it attractive, in line with the blog’s own brand, and readers will keep coming. But there are many blogs now, especially versions of established media brands, that absolutely litter the body of their text with dynamic ads that are begging for a new ad-blocking technology market…Web Tivo so to speak.
But for emerging brands, especially those who understand the spirit of the bloggers’ ethic, and the humane treatment of readers, adverting on blogs just can’t be beat.
Bruce: you have a good point, but the blog-reading public is pretty savvy about advertorial and thinly-couched sales tactics. It would only a matter of time until that sort of blog were called out as a sham or ignored altogether.
I think Bruce makes a great point about observing the distinction between advertising and editorial — one that I did not spend enough time on in this article.
I did not mean to suggest — in any way — that small businesses should approach bloggers and offer payment in exchange for writing favorable product reviews or pay-per-posts or any such nonsense.
Instead, offer information. Offer up executives for interviews and be open to answering questions, even tough questions, from bloggers — just like you do with the media. Better yet, read the blogger’s blog and participate in their community just everyone else.
But as a completely separate matter also consider advertising in appropriately designated ad slots on blogs — because advertising helps with brand awareness.
But always keep the two separate. And keep it transparent with regard to any relationships between bloggers and companies.
[...] Read the entire article — I think it will be worth your while: Blogs Hunger for Your Brand. [...]
Do you know the prognosis for the increase of corporate blogging per year? Now it is about 12% company blogs.
[...] Read the entire article — I think it will be worth your while: Blogs Hunger for Your Brand. [...]
Great post, Anita. I like your take aways and summary of Technorati. The concern Bruce raises is valid but I think this is one domain that will be difficult for paying-for-praise will fail miserably. Blogger independence is an important part of what attracts the loyal following. When that independence is purchased and the blogger turned into just another PR tool it is a self-decapitation of opportunity for the blogger and the company.
It isn’t that people don’t want ads or info. They just want it through a conduit they trust on a subject they actively engage and they don’t want to feel manipulated in the process. Hard to achieve that last one with a blogger buy-off or buy-out.
Corporate blogs have great potential because there is no mistaking what they are about – connecting to the customer for the purpose of selling a product/service. No manipulation exists because the agenda is known to both sides. Corporations that blog authentically will do well and bloggers that blog independently will do well. When corporations buy-off bloggers both lose – and so does their audience.
How about micro-blogging such as twitting? Could they as well be used for marketing in one or the different form?
[...] won’t bore you with a lot of statistics, so here’s the nice condensed version from Anita Campbell. Still too lazy to click the link? Fine. I’ll tell you. It says people [...]