Companies can use blogs in a wide variety of ways, all of them beneficial. Yet, business blogs are few and far between in many sectors. Concerns that commonly hold companies back include …

1. We don’t have time. With the right preparation, writing and managing a blog does not have to consume vast chunks of time. Outsourcing or sharing writing, editing and marketing tasks with companies like ours can further lighten the load–and enhance quality.

2. We don’t want to publish negative comments. I hear this frequently. There are many strategies for handling comments; everything from disallowing them, period, to opening the door wide open. Comment strategy depends on the purpose of the blog, the sensitivity and/or confidentiality of the subject matter, and a few other factors. Bottom line–the company always controls what information it chooses to publish. That being said, an unwillingness to display negative comments under any circumstances can backfire–in more ways than one.

3. Our customers don’t read blogs. My first reaction when I hear this is, maybe you should start cultivating some new customers! Fact is, while older people may or may not know a blog from a polliwog, younger ones do. For them, blogging is already as natural as using a cell phone or an iPod. The time for companies to capture these new potential customers is now. If the competition gets there first, there’s no second place.

4. We don’t need a strong Web presence. Understandably, this attitude is more prevalent among B2B’s than B2C’s. However, consumers and businesses are flocking to the major search engines by the tens of millions to find products and services and evaluate suppliers.

Statistics indicate over 6 billion searches are conducted every month in the USA alone. With few exceptions, a company’s Web site is its first impression. One of the best–and least expensive–methods of optimizing search results is a blog.

Any marketing department that fails to include blogging in its Web marketing program is overlooking an enormous opportunity. Not only is a blog a powerful optimization tool in itself, it integrates beautifully with paid search campaigns, newletters, public relations initiatives, and other forms of online marketing.

5. Blogs sound interesting, but we don’t have a plan. That can change–let’s talk!