As readers become more involved with the blogs they frequent, a new form of communication is becoming prevalent – interactive blogging. There are a few ways to look at this and determine whether or not this form of interaction is right for your corporate blog and your readers. When used properly, interactive blogging can be a huge weapon in your arsenal towards building better relationships with your customers, but it can be a double edged sword.

First, let’s look at the most common form of interactive blogging, using your posts to answer reader questions. This commonly occurs when you have someone leave you a question in the comments section of your blog, frequently asking for more information on a certain topic. Now, if one person asks this question there is always a chance that there are more people that want to know the same thing.

You can use these comments to determine what your readers really want to know. If it’s a good question, consider writing a blog post that will answer it. If not, you can keep focusing your energies on your regular posts. However, it is a good idea to let your reader’s dictate what you will be writing about – at least to some extent – since this can help you develop a stronger reader following.

The second form of interactive blogging takes your comments section to a whole new level. This is where you encourage your readers to contribute on a regular basis and the comments section may even start to look a bit like a message board. This is another powerful tool that can benefit corporate blog owners.

First, you’ll be getting the benefit of having your readers return throughout the day to keep tabs on the ongoing conversation. You can also set up an RSS feed for your comments to make this easier. Second, you’ll be increasing the amount of page views you have as well as the opportunity to attract new readers through word of mouth advertising, and through search engine indexing.

Interactive blogging does have a catch though, as we mentioned above. If you can keep tabs on your readers and avoid having flame wars, or nasty comments, it can work quite well. However, if you let it get out of hand, you’re only asking for trouble. On one side, you’ll have readers that will wonder where you stand on the issue if you don’t take care of a problem, and on the other hand, if you take quick action and delete problem comments, you may be cast as against freedom of speech.

The easiest way to take advantage of interactive blogging is simply to set some ground rules, make them clear, and then stick to them. If your readers know right off the bat what they can and cannot do with your interactive blogging elements, there will be a lot less confusion and a lot more interacting going on. Try it for a week and see how your corporate blog changes.

Photo Credits: 1

Originally posted 2008-11-07 05:35:27. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

• Does Your Company Need a Blog? One of the latest trends is corporate blogging, but is it right for you company? Not every company under the sun can benefit from having a blog, but there are quite a few benefits that can be reaped in the right circumstances. First, you'll need to decide what you want......
• Three Must-Read Books for Corporate Bloggers Bloggers certainly love to read other blogs, but they also may be able to generate powerful resources from books on the subject of blogging. Here are three must read books for anyone who is serious about corporate blogging on a successful level. 1 - "The Corporate Blogging Book: Absolutely Everything......
• The Secret Power of Blogging By Bruce Brown If you have been thinking about jumping into the world of corporate blogging, but you’re not really sure if it’s right for you, this book may push you off the fence. This book does a fantastic job of explaining everything you could ever need to know about running your own......
• Does Your Corporate Blog Need Video? Although video content is lauded and championed as the future of the internet, there is still a lot of dissension over whether it has a place in corporate blogging. While there is no one clear answer to this, there are a few benefits that videos can bring, as well as......
• How to Start a Stellar Corporate Blog If you’re ready to get into corporate blogging, you need to make sure that you are going in with the right attitude. There is a big difference between starting an okay blog and starting a stellar blog. You are in this to succeed, so you need to make sure that......

• How To Create Loyal Blog Readers One of the main differences between a blog and a static website is the way people are able to interact with your content. With a static site it's just people reading words on a page. When you have a blog they can explore and even comment back! You want to......
• Turning Blog Visitors into Blog Readers One of the most important things that you can understand when it comes to your blog and attracting readers is that there is a difference between people who are blog visitors and people who are blog readers. Blog visitors are people that are attracted to your blog for one reason......
• Advice to Carnival Hosts As you might know, from any of the times I've mentioned it on my blog or via my Tweeter account (@amateurfinance, just in case you're curious), I recently hosted the Carnival of Twenty-Something Finances.  It was an interesting and even, dare I say, fun experience, but it was a little......
• Keep Readers Coming Back to Your Blog If you have a blog, you want to keep readers coming back. You can attract readers in a variety of ways, but keeping them is a little harder. You may end up high in the search engines for tons of keywords and pull in tons of unique page views. But......
• Frugal Things To Do All Over The Money Life Network is at it again! This time we're providing you with a resource of frugal things to do all over the country (and hopefully other locations too).  Each of our seven member sites will be giving you frugal ideas for the city they come from.  Check......