What do you want from your blog?

This question is often asked to late: and by late I mean after the blog is launched and the few people that read your articles already see you in a certain way. It’s wrong? Why? Because you may find that you’re sending the wrong message and thus, you’re attracting the wrong kind of people. A tool becomes gold in the hands of the one its using it.

I think that a blog can be used in one of these ways:

-          To be popular in a certain community or to express yourself: to be able to speak your mind, to talk all kind of things with no obvious connection – things that are on your mind

-          To make money

-          To build a brand

-          To build a business which is the hardest of all because it involves building a brand and also making money at the same time

This article is for those that want to build a business on the web by using a blog. Even if you think about developing an online store you have to consider blogging. Why? Because in a crowded market you have to differentiate yourself from the whole. And by developing a blog you can show to the people what you have to offer.

As I said, in my opinion, a web business involves building a brand and making money at the same time.

Here is how I see the two elements.

Building a web brand. To become a BRAND you have to be synonym with the solution to a problem (need). First, start building an audience: you are the one that talks and all your blog visitors are listening to you. Then, you start turning your audience in a community: this is when all the visitors talk with each other and start initiating discussions, pose questions, raise problems.

This is the moment when you have to listen to the community and find out what their problems are, what questions are they posing – basically what they need. You can also do this in any other community: the difference is that on your blog you have the ability to serve that community and better control the situation – plus you can harvest the results.

Now it’s time to start developing solutions for the needs you identified. You have two choices: either you go for volume or for niche.  First of all, your solution has to work. Second, you have to be able to adapt it easily and with minimum effort and costs. And third, you have to think if you can develop a solution that serves multiple needs or you’ll concentrate on all the different aspects of only one need.

It’s very likely you’ll start addressing multiple needs or one big general need and in time you’ll customize the solution for niches. As an example I’m thinking to Coca Cola. First it was about your thirst. Now, it’s your thirst but in different situations: you’re hot, you just woke up, you just eat a spicy meal, you just want to be cool, etc. – and in different countries different flavors that match the needs of those people.

Making money on the web: the key factor. I think that here we’re talking about trust. If people trust you and your solution to their problem they’ll buy from you. So, how do you obtain trust? Here are some ideas:

-          Your articles should always offer a response to a real question and you should write in a constant way

-          Offer quality free advices

-          Keep your fees as low as possible and compensate with testimonials – it helps to see that others are writing good things about you

-          Write guest posts – it helps to see that other blog owners from your market trust you to write on their blog

Small/starting tips and suggestions. Concentrate on how to develop your blog in the direction you want. Don’t wake up in the morning and waste your time with posting on social networks. First, think of your blog. Write an article, see what the competition is doing, identify blogs to request a guest post, prepare guest articles. Social networks are just a support of you and your work. Don’t expect to build a business because of your Twitter activity or Facebook page if you don’t have a good home-base: a good blog.

And last one, if you want to build a web business, do it on your own domain – install your blog, configure it to be search engine friendly, build a plan of what to write about and what keywords to target and keep going forward.

In the end I would like to ask you what do you think of all this: maybe you have something to add, or you don’t agree with me. Share your thoughts in comments bellow.