So what do we have here?

The term blog is a combination of the terms web and log. Blogs are a personal website with content displayed in reverse-chronological order making it easy for the reader to see new posts. Blogging has been around since the early days of the Internet and has evolved along with changing technology, awareness, and cultural norms. Users can add text, pictures, videos, and animations to their ‘posts’. A post is constructed and then published on the site for anyone who visits the URL to see.

 

Blogging is a form of new media, and one that is far from reaching its potential. Quantity and quality of blogs are rising and audience members have limitless topics to choose from. In the United States alone, there are over 20 million bloggers, with 1.7 million profiting from the work, and 452,000 of those using blogging as their primary source of income (Penn, 2009). There are mass amounts of people looking to use advertising on their blogs as a way to support their love of writing. Bloggers are looking for the right products and services to pass along to their readers, and advertisers are only at the cusp of what they can offer to these devoted influencers.

 

Companies worldwide are looking for creative, high impact and accountable marketing; on the smallest budget possible. With concerns over the recession and its impact on marketing, a poll of 17,000 subscribers of Online Marketing Blog was run to discover intentions for digital marketing tactics in 2009. Poll respondents cast 1,559 votes for their top three digital marketing tactics (from a list of 45) for 2009. Blogging was at the top of the list with 34% of respondents planning to develop a presence on blogs, Micro-blogging i.e. Twitter was a close second having a response rate of 29%. Out of the top ten rated marketing tactics, six fell into the category of Social Media Marketing which includes pay per click advertising (14%) and blogger relations (12%)(Oden, 2009). The statistics show that blogging has not yet reached its potential, and it will continue to grow as more industry professionals take the plunge into the blogging world. Clients and creatives are only at the cusp of what social media can do for their product. Blogging presents a medium that conquers the two main downfalls of traditional advertising –reaching a specific target market and figuring out what that market is responding positively too.