Opinions on what is better between blogging and social media abound, and if you are a fan of forum debates, you would find these discussions to come through the overwhelming, to the definite, and even to the bizarre lines of reasons. While others are intent and hardcore apologists of blogging, a large group of netizens are also more interested on social networking, which can be considered the holy grail of global connectivity.
For others, the era of social media marks the end of the blogging generation. Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Instagram, and many other platforms have replaced the period of creating contents, sharing them to connections, and commenting to increase interactions. These arguments and declarations, however, are pointless and baseless.
In general terms, both blogging and social networking are tremendously important as lifeblood of the online business. Take the other out of the context, and it will lead you to a half-cooked meal. The two are separate and distinct, but they co-inhabit and are interdependent on each other for the achievement of the purpose of the online business.
Keep on reading to know why you should blog without missing the whole point of joining social media.
Why Should I Blog?
For us to understand the whole context of blogging, we need to roll back to its own history. It all started on a simple personal homepage, and the whole trend of blogging traditional news rolled out quite good. The early 2000s marked the peak of the blogging era, as they call it. Blogs come in various forms such as personal, political, techie, religious, how-to, and many others. And with blogging platforms like Live Journal, WordPress, and Blogger, the period has truly grown big.
What blogging did was give an opportunity for those who want to be heard and read to join the communication community. Instead of just relying to mainstream communications involving journalists, blogging offers those who want to share something without getting cut by editorial guidelines a chance to be part of the “media”. People are left to their own minds, speak whatever they want, and write their own stories. It is the new trend of the time.
Now you should blog because it is the foundation. For search engines, content is still king. Quality and updated contents are website optimizers for search engine ranking. Search engines may change their algorithm to weigh websites, but their attitude toward contents remain the same. Why? Because it is the foundation. And this is why you need to blog.
And speaking about foundation, these blog contents once published online became part of a global archive that remains the same and useful. The blog content does not just give your business a visibility for an hour or a day after you posted something. Rather, it provides you visibility that spans long period of time. It just stays there – and you may think it is doing nothing – but it is working to build your presence. The idea there is make quality contents today to benefit in search engine ranking for a long time.
The next reason why you should blog is its nature. Basically, you own your blog. You can do whatever you want, post whatever you think is good, and evaluate your performance whenever you need to. It is through here you can showcase your knowledge on SEO, photo and video production, and many other things. As long as you don't get into the nostril of Google's bad-list, you will make it good. One of the thing you need to avoid is scamming customers. Be true to your business for whatever evil you do will always slap you big time. Google may ban you from their indexes, and it is proven not good for your business.
All these underlying rationales are just few of the thousand reasons why you should blog. You can't undermine its importance and logic to the business growth. However, you should not also leave out the whole mantra of social media.
Why Should I Join Social Media?
The greatness of social media can be simplified on how it can create a media personality without the prevalent influence of big names on Hollywood or Los Angeles. A single photo shared on Instagram, retwitted on Twitter, and liked on Facebook can make an unaware and unassuming New Year's Eve couple smooching in front of the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree instant celebrities – and they may even get the attention of Oprah. This is the power of social media.
And this why you should join social networks.
Think of the millions on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, MySpace, and many other social media platforms. This is a very large audience. And if you can tap on this resource, you will make it big. A single tweet can reach millions of people – and it will just make your server too busy. It is good way to stay visible to their eyes. They read tweets everyday than they search something on the web. They exchange photos on Instagram than they look for online news.
As customers' behavior change over the past years, your business needs to work on it. Through social media, you can keep them updated with your business. Well, sending newsletters to their emails still works, but using social media for marketing minus the sales pitch is a must for the business.
Plus, you can always use social media to increase search engine rankings. Updated Facebook pages and Twitter accounts rank well on search results. It is a good opportunity to direct targeted traffic to your business website.
There isn't a reason why you should ignore social media for your online business. If you want a cheap, efficient, and direct method to reach customers deeply and closely, social media is a massive tool.
How to Make Much of Blogging and Social Media?
So what's the point? Which is better between the two? Will blogging be enough to solve the low traffic and online presence of your online business? Or should you try joining every single social media outfit you can find?
Both are important. Online survival speaks of blogging and social media.
I recommend starting off your blog first, posting contents, and making it visible to search engines. From there you can do anything. Social media sharing options can be added to your blog. It creates a connection between your social media and your blog posts. As a result, social media creates your instant visibility while blogging commands long-time presence. At anytime, anybody can share your post to Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter. What do you think on that?
Blogging and social media should come together for the direct achievement of the purpose of the blog. Just be creative on how to combine these two important aspects of online business. I am sure, you will do well.
