We’ve been talking about three big reasons you should be blogging. The past two articles have shown how blogging generates traffic and credibility. Now, let’s take a look at the third reason we think you should be blogging.
#3: Feedback
The whole idea behind blogging is to start a conversation amongst people with similar interests. Rather than just reading an article or an eBook, blogs allow the reader to write back, share their thoughts and opinions, and add more content to the conversation.
There are three reasons why feedback is so valuable to you.
- It’s a sign that the reader is engaged
- It gives you direct market feedback on the ideas you are presenting
- It helps to stimulate new ideas
A blog reader who takes the time to respond with a comment is an engaged reader. Since you are probably blogging to promote your business, an engaged reader is an engaged prospect. Beyond the immediate benefit of having a potential sale wanting to have a conversation with you, you can see bigger trends.
Look at the comments you receive in response to several different blog posts. Try to identify patterns. What topics generated the biggest response? Was there some particular style or language that was common to the posts with big response? The answers to these questions will tell you what your market responds to.
The second reason feedback is so important is that it tells you what people think about the ideas you are blogging about. This is another great opportunity to understand your market and their perceptions of your business. Perhaps you wrote about the importance of customer service, but you had several comments on your company’s lack of it- now you know what needs to be fixed.
If you are a consultant or you develop information products, the feedback to your blog posts are an opportunity to test your material before committing to development of an entire book or seminar. Write a series of blog posts that summarize the key points. Then simply monitor the comments.
You can see instantly what people think of that topic. And from there you can either decide that the topic is good, needs a little polishing, or has missed the mark completely. It’s much better to spend a few hours upfront on some market research, than to spend hundreds of hours developing your content and have it fail!
The third reason follows directly from the second. Reader feedback is often a great way to identify new ideas or a new twist on what you’ve been writing about. When a reader leaves a comment, they are telling you what is on their mind – in their own words. This is priceless because it gives you a clear understanding of what your market is thinking about and the words they use to describe it.
If the feedback you are getting tells you that you need to make some changes, the new ideas you can get from the market’s feedback will often tell you what those changes should be.
These three great benefits of feedback all build upon each other. Let’s say you write an article and get some useful comments. You can respond to the reader who left the comment and start a conversation.
Happy Blogging!
