The Irish Internet Association (IIA) launched a Guide to Business Blogging in Ireland on April 22nd 2009. As a member of the Social Media Working Group tasked with developing this research for the IIA, John McGuinness, Murray Consultants details key findings of a recent survey of Business Bloggers.
Irish businesses today are facing the ever expanding challenge of the growth of New Media. More and more consumers are going online to research, gain feedback, compare prices, and review product histories before they proceed to purchase. Ratings websites, discussion boards, social network sites, blogs and Twitter are all helping to put more raw information in the hands of consumers.
Getting to grips with the New Media sphere can be a pretty daunting task – the IIA Guide to Business Blogging aims to provide helpful markers for companies going down the path of an online environment – helping them understand how they can appropriately interact with their customers online, enabling them not only to defend their brand reputation but also enhance it.
The IIA Social Media Working Group undertook a nationwide survey of Business Bloggers as part of the research process in the development of The ‘IIA Guide to Business Blogging in Ireland’. The Guide will be released in electronic format on 22nd April at a breakfast briefing in the Burlington Hotel.
The survey found that over one third (39%) of the Irish business blogging community use their blog as a source for sales leads, while nearly three quarters cite ‚’positive feedback from customers‚’ as a key measure of blogging success.
As regards frequency and commitment, 39% of business bloggers post several times a week, 50% spend up to 4 hours each week blogging with 32% spending up to eight hours a week blogging.
Sales leads aside, additional benefits of a well-maintained blog included an improved Google ranking, thus making it easier for the business to be found online. Whilst demonstrating expertise in a given sector was emphatically identified by 79% of respondents as a key objective for a blog.
Positive customer feedback (73%) and unique visitors (50%) were both detailed as key indicators for return of investment of time and expertise in a blog.
The IIA Social Media Working Group plans to release four more guides in the coming months and intends to run the Business Blogging survey on an annual basis going forward. If you would like additional information or a copy of the Business Blogging Guide please contact John McGuinness on the details below.
Business Bloggers: Examples
No Nonsense Car Insurance – http://blog.nononsense.ie
The No Nonsense Car Insurance blog offers tips on buying insurance, saving money and talks about a range of other topics that No Nonsense feel their customers would be interested in. The blog has so far delivered increased visibility on search engines and has seen an increased profile for the new brand.
PaddyPower Trader – http://www.paddypowertrader.com
The Paddy Power Trader blog supports financial markets traders (many of whom trade from home, some of whom are novices) with education, views on the market and examples of ‘how the professionals do it’. Paddy Power see blogs and community as a unique selling point of their service, engendering loyalty, attracting new customers, improving stickiness and increasing average spend per client
RecruitIreland (Twitter) – http://www.twitter.com/recruitireland
RecruitIreland began to microblog on Twitter to give the website a personality and to answer questions from candidates and companies who are recruiting with a view to differentiating themselves from the competition. The activity on Twitter has generated sales leads in addition to feedback and suggestions from candidates about how to do things differently or feedback about usability which they see as invaluable.
Ice Cream Ireland – http://www.icecreamireland.com
The Ice Cream Ireland blog is the business blog of Murphy’s Ice Cream. In addition to dozens of recipes the blog provides news and updates to customers on the business’s activities and new products. The blog has brought customers to their retail shops, helped facilitate comments, complaints, and suggestions and sense of community among customers. The business has received much publicity as a result of the blog and a book deal for an ice cream cookbook ‘The Book of Sweet Things‚’ came directly as a result of the blog.
Blacknight – http://blog.blacknight.com
The Blacknight blogs cover a variety of topics, from promotional / marketing through general news and technical topics. The blog has won numerous awards as well as generating PR and press coverage for the business.
For further information contact:
John McGuinness
Senior Consultant
Murray Consultants
01 498 0361
jmcguinness@murrayconsult.ie
Murray Consultants Technology & New Media
The Technology & New Media team specialises in national, regional and global campaigns that get results. We are equally at home working with the world’s biggest technology brands and with early stage start ups.
While the media heartland for many of our clients is the IT and telecom press, the scope of market influence that we create for them covers business magazines, social media, blogs, national, regional and international newspapers, and broadcast outlets.
Our team combines professional pride, a passion for technology and a deep understanding of the industries we work in from Telecommunications, ICT and Software Development to Consumer technology offerings.
Our New Media expertise has resulted in a significant number of companies large and small availing of these cost effective new media tools to develop open and honest two way communication with customers, potential customers and the public at large.