Buyers want to hear it from people they trust, say Christina Piet and Linda Coles.
Blogging about your business, or better yet, getting others to blog favourably about your service or product can have an extremely big impact and the great thing is it's all free. But for those just getting comfortable with the blog format, technology may already be moving on. Facebook is where a lot of businesses are doing their communicating.
How can you market your company internationally through using influential blogging networks?
Christina Piet: We harnessed the power of the "mommy blogger" for a successful launch of our NZ-made solids starter kit in the US market earlier this year.
A few high-profile US bloggers have increased product awareness and introduced our premium baby food freezing trays directly to our highly targeted market of new mums - specifically those with babies starting solids - in a way we never could have done through traditional channels.
After the solids starter kit reviews from three high-profile mommy bloggers were published, US sales quadrupled from February to March and continue to climb steadily.
In New Zealand, mums can see the solids starter kit in stores nationwide at Baby City, ecostore and boutique baby stores as well as buying online.
In the US, however, we sell only online at the moment making reviews from influential mommy bloggers even more critical to our success.
It's not enough for us to tell US mums about our large capacity but compact trays.
They want to hear it from people they know and trust. Mums, for instance, like Natali Morris, the CBS commentator, the mother of a baby starting solids and a highly influential mommy blogger.
Do you have to pay influential bloggers a fee to talk about your product?
It costs nothing. Except for supplying product samples and postage it is free to submit your product to most mommy bloggers to review.
The key is knowing who the best bloggers are for your particular niche. New Zealand-based Module Marketing is the expert in marrying NZ-made baby products with high profile mommy bloggers in the US.
How can you blog effectively for your business?
Linda Coles: At its best blogging is a great way to get a different side of your business across to your customers and prospects, and is a little less formal than your website.
It need not even be a blog but simply another site set up to appeal to a slightly different audience than your formal website but still give some great resources and lighter conversation. A bit more coffee shop than boardroom.
You can see a great example of this from Westpac who not only have their regular website, but have recently set up another site called www.goodbusiness.co.nz. It is full of tips, advice and resources in a really clear format.
Are there emerging trends in this area?
Things are changing though, and many companies now see blogging as a thing of the past and are moving their conversation to sites such as Facebook.
The beauty of setting up a Facebook business page is there is already an audience of around 600 million people worldwide to tap into and make use of the viral effect Facebook offers.
You can set up a business Facebook page relatively simply and by adding in all sorts of applications, you can have a great site very easily. Like many of the blogging platforms it is free.
Christina Piet is owner of baby food storage company mumi&bubi, and Linda Coles is the founder of social media training company Blue Banana.
