LazBro, Inc. - Bloggers are powerful, and so is blogging

Should brands care about the blogosphere?

BLOGGERS

Podcasts, Vlogcasts, and the good 'ol blog. Why should a brand care?

The days of pushing a message to a consumer, and hoping that it is going to resonate have come and gone. The discerning consumer spends their time researching and listening to other peoples voices. The "online testimonial" is alive an kicking.

In direct response marketing, one of the most powerful tools available to a marketer is the testimonial. You have seen it time and time again: "My life has never been better since I started using this product!" Never before in the history of marketing has the consumer had the opportunity to do as much research on a product, or be as influenced by their group of peers. Web 2.0 has opened up the flood gates of consumer participation and communication, generating highly searchable content that lands up on the first page of Google results, right underneath the brand term they are discussing.

Blogs, podcasts, video blogs, and all the other social media tools that are freely available have cornered the SEO market, generating bot-friendly content. When a brand gets involved, consumers interested in the product find relevent content to eat up, and consumers looking to voice a concern find a forum to comment on.

It is imperative that brands get in on the action and become content producers while facilitating conversations, helping the consumer to generate positive online testimonials and keeping the brand SEO on the first page of Google as brand positive as possible.