I am seldom ever asked (but should be) the question, “Should I be blogging in order to promote my website?” Basically, people just naturally fall into one of two camps on the issue. They either: 1. assume it’s a good idea. Or, 2. they’re too intimidated to try blogging because they feel they’re not good enough of a writer.

My answer? Well, since I clearly blog myself, you can probably guess that I think blogging can be a good idea under some circumstances. But, in what situations should you spend your time blogging, and how can it help? Here are my thoughts on the matter:

Blogging can help you:

1. Build more relevant content for your website (search engines love content!).
2. Remain focused on your core competencies and keep your skills sharp by writing about what you already know and love to do.
3. Keep your customers, colleagues and prospects informed about what you are doing, thinking and feeling about your area of specialization.
4. Send more (but not necessarily tons more – see below) traffic to your website.

However, blogging is not likely to help you:

1. Get famous. (In fact, it won’t even help you get “Internet famous.”)
2. Instantly get thousands of visitors to your site.
3. Stir deep public debate.*

* Yes, there are people out there doing all of these latter 3 things via blogging, but they have been blogging practically since the Internet was the ARPANET and Seinfeld was barely into its 3rd season. Nowadays, there are tens of millions of blogs out there – the compeition is stiff, to say the least.

So, set the right expectatations and get blogging!