This is a relationship building tool and should be used consistently. Even if you don’t see immediate results, remember that customers like to read your content and get value out of it.

Let’s say you start your blog with a great tip that helps make your customer money through better selling practices. Your blog visitor will definitely come back to read your blog to get more valuable tips. If you continue to deliver great content to truly help your visitors, they will eventually purchase items from your business whether from personally visiting your place of business or buying directly from your website if you offer a great product or service that they need.

Building community involves getting feedback from your customers as well. As mentioned in previous blog posts, a blog site enables a “two way” communication between visitor and blogger. Always keep your “allow comments” button on with every post you make. You will be surprised at the positive feedback you get on your products and your business. Be prepared for negative feedback too. Quite often you can get ideas on how to improve your business from critical feedback.

Check out the video below where Seth Godin goes far deep into making your business indispensible to your customers.

Inserting an “opt in” box in either the upper right corner or within the header of your blog site is the “tried and true” way to maximize the chances of growing your customer list online.

If you were to check the upper right corner of our blog, Blog Marketing Experts, you will see our opt in box. We offer a free report on how to grow profits in your business if you were to enter your first name and email address. We pledge to keep you, as a subsciber updated on the lastest things in the business blog world as well as notifying you of our products and services at substantial discounts.

There are many advantages to both you and your subsribers in this method of marketing. First, the subscriber gets to keep in touch with you and is available to give you direct feedback on your business since they now have a way to contact you. Second, it gives you the opportunity to develop a relationship with your subscriber that will eventually turn into a paying customer.

The greatest advantage is that both you and your subscriber become long term connections and therefore help to perpetuate your business way into the future. With a solid customer base, you stand to generate sales through any economic climate.

Whatever the case, your obligation is to be the “thought leader” in your industry. It should not be hard because, if you are in business for the long term, it goes without saying that you will be committed to making every effort to keep your customers interested so you can make more sales both now and into the future.

If you want to keep your customers coming back to buy your products and services, you give them a reason to come back and visit your store by changing the products you offer, continue educating your customers with what makes your products stand out over the competitors.

Building community means creating a relationship with your customers and making them feel comfortable with regular communication. It could be in the form of a blog, a forum, or an email subscriber list. In any case, with regular forms of communication, you can be assured of growing a solid fan base for your business.

The blogger, being the author/publisher and the visitor, being the consumer of the blog content can develop a deep relationship. The blogger and develop trust with the visitor and the visitor gets more familiar with the products and services from the blogger.

When making blog posts, remember to provide timely news about your product or service. Address the concerns of your customers and keep them interested in what you have to offer.

For those of you who have a “brick and mortar” business, remind them of reasons to visit your store. It could be a “gotta have it” sale or an open house or a value added in house seminar.

Customers love it when they can give you feedback on your product through a blog. They know that many other people will see this and make you proud or make you defend your position on something they have brought up.

Embrace communication from your visitors whether good or bad. When someone makes a favorable comment, of course you are going to leave it in and be very proud of yourself. But also leave a comment that makes a complaint, because that is the time you can make a comment right back to the commenter about how to fix a problem or how to make things right so that the public at large gets to see how professional you are at public relations.

In a sense, the two way communication that a blog allows IS public relations. It allows for your business to be in a favorable light and builds credibility.

Blog marketing is all about communications with your audience.

Check out the video below.

Here is a video that goes over the basics of video posting to a blog.

The blog medium is part of the social media movement and will probably continue for many years to come. If your business is not blogging, you should start now.

According to marketing guru, Jay Abraham, there are essentially three ways to get business.

• increase the number of customers
• increase the number of orders from these customers
• increase the dollar amount from these customers

Simple as it may seem, this is the formula that will propel any business in any economy, whether we are in a down cycle or up cycle.

In the process of achieving these three things, we must first develop a “community” of loyal followers to your business. In other words, build the trust and credibility and you can’t go wrong.

To build community, you have to attract your target market with what they need. It may seem common sense, but most business don’t practice the obvious sometimes! To build community is a long term proposition. Once your markteing program is in place to make a community, you have to tend to it on a permenant basis.

Take, for example, when you develop and implement an opt in box on your site to attract subscribers to your email newsletter. Your responsibility doesn’t end there. You have to think it through on the real reason why you want subscribers in the first place. You want subscribers to trust you on your opinions and views on your product or service. You build trust and then community starts to form. You have a common interest. Your subscribers are your best “salesman.”

Once the community forms, you have like minded people who have the same views that you have and it then becomes unshakeable.

When you community is in place, you will sell your products and services again and again.