Do Blogs Influence Purchase Decisions? BuzzLogic Research Study says “Yes!”

Although Wired magazine may believe that blogging is dead (see “Twitter, Flickr, Facebook Make Blogs Look So 2004“), consumers haven’t apparently gotten the memo.

In fact, the results from a recently released study sponsored by BuzzLogic shows that blogs have a significant influence on purchasing decisions. (See “Study” Blogging’s Dead? Someone Forgot to Tell Readers.” and the BuzzLogic news release summarizing the research results.)

Key findings from the BuzzLogic research across 2,000 online consumers?

• 50 percent of blog readers find blogs useful for purchase information;
• 52 percent of blog readers said that blogs played a role at the critical moment when they decided to move forward with a purchase; and
• 40 percent of blog readers say they have taken action based upon seeing an ad on a blog.

Additionally, consumers also said that reading blogs helped them

• Decide on a product or service (21 percent);
• Refine choices (19 percent);
• Get support or answers (19 percent); and
• Discover products and services (17 percent).

Naturally, I recognize that I’m writing about some of the benefits of having a blog within my own blog post (kinda like a self-fulfilling prophecy.) But just because I’m using this medium doesn’t make the research findings any less important or useful.

If you (or your organization) don’t have a blog, start one! Today!

If you have a blog, make sure you’re adding to your blog on a regular basis.

Promote your blog regularly via social media tools/services, email, and other more traditional marketing and sales vehicles.

And don’t just take my word for it - research backs up this premise: Blogging pays for itself! 

The Role of Social Media in Branding Efforts

My friend Jason Kintzler (@PitchEngine) - founder of Pitch Engine and overall social media junkie - started a personal blog the other day called New Media Cowboy and launched it with a post entitled “Social Media is Branding.”

Kintzler’s post reminded me that many internal branding efforts are misdirected at best because they’re caught up in the old world way of marketing-think: Specifically, “I (the big, important marketing executive) will tell you (the lucky consumer) what to think about and how to act toward my brand (be it product, service or organization).

This approach is so bass-ackwards it’s laughable, and yet it’s still the way many companies attempt to brand themselves, their products and/or services.

In reality, the definition of a brand has always been directed by those on the receiving ends of any and all communication and marketing efforts and NOT by those on the sending end.

It’s like my very first communications professor at BYU said: “You cannot not communicate.”

In other words, everything we do or say is a form of communication (or marketing, if you will). But since an effective form of mind control has not yet been invented (thank goodness), we cannot control how others will perceive such communication efforts.

Hence, communication has NEVER been a one-way street; rather (at a minimum) communication is a two-way thoroughfare (marketing too). And it is the perception of those receiving any marketing message that determines the brand of an organization, a product, a service or person and NOT the other way around.

“The perception of those receiving any marketing message determines (one’s) brand . . . NOT the other way around.”

That’s what intrigued me about Jason’s post.

He suggests that social media and the tools/services that make up social networking efforts are in fact branding efforts at their very core because they’re all about two-way communication and engaging individuals with one’s organization, product, service or person.

The reason why this observation is so critical is that the best customers are not just repeat customers - they’re evangelizers. They tell others about their great experiences with your brand and as a result they expand your sales, marketing and communications efforts many, many fold.

Why? Because they’re not on your payroll; they’re independent from your organization. As a result, what they write, say and/or do has a HUGE CREDIBILITY - often times generating more impact than virtually any other thing that you might attempt.

Kintzler’s right - social media is ALL ABOUT BRANDING. 

This is a very important concept to grasp and it should flavor any social networking effort undertaken by every marketing, PR, new media and/or communications pro from this point forward.

Do Your Online Press Releases Make a Good First Impression?

Thousands of press releases make the rounds on computer screens every day - milling around in editorial systems, emails, RSS feeds, and online news portals like a literary Times Square.  Whether you post releases to your website or utilize a wire service, the challenge is this:  How can you make your content stand out from the crowd?

In my opinion, the headline is the most important aspect of a press release and falls under the “you never get a second chance to make first impression” category. After all, if you can’t persuade someone to open your release they can’t really read it, can they?

A headline should be compelling, it should succinctly state the theme of your release, and it should make someone want to know more. That’s it. The sub headline and body of text should have the honor of going into detail.

So what can you keep in mind when crafting your releases for a company newsroom or for online distribution?

Write a headline that is keyword rich. You know your audience. What terms or phrases will catch their attention and make them want more info? Think “hot buttons.” It is your release vs. everyone else’s.

For online releases, the headline becomes the page title. The headline becomes the press release’s page title in the HTML source code. This is one of the pieces of content that search engines use to index your press release. According to SEOmoz’s most recent Search Engine Ranking Factors, keyword usage in the page title is the #1 positive factor in search engine rankings.

Google only displays the first 63 characters of a headline. I use Google as an example, as they own a majority of search market share. I’m not saying that you should make all headlines 63 characters - just try to front-load your headline with the most valuable part of your headline so the important stuff is visible in search engine results pages (SERPs). Yahoo! shows 120-characters, in case you’re curious.

Headline creation should take you a long time. Between picking key terms that will attract your audience, coming up with a succinct way to describe what your readers can expect from your release, and considering what your readers will see should they stumble across your release in SERPs, you have a project on your hands. In the end, it will be worth it.

Your headline is the first thing people will see, and it is the key to having a release that’s read vs. one that isn’t. It also is someone’s first impression of your release.

Make it a good one.

Blogging about Blogging

Starting and then maintaining a blog can be challenging if you haven’t thought through a couple of important questions:

1. What should I blog about, and

2. How often should I blog

Jon Greer, author of BNET’s Catching Flack blog has some great points and additional links for business owners looking to start their own blog.

Read Jon’s original blog post on BNET