CT Biz Blogs

For small, small businesses that have little money for advertising and don’t have a Web site, a blog can become your Web presence…

I mentioned this excellent article back in August. It’s a great introduction from the San Francisco Chronicle to why small businesses should blog.

One of the examples they cite is the Green Cine Daily, a blog for GreenCine, an online DVD rental and video-on-demand company.

According to the article, Dennis Woo, the owner of GreenCine, has doubled his business in 2004 because of the weblog.

Take a look at the excellent GreenCine blog, and compare it to the Tommy K video web site.

Actually, this is comparing apples to oranges. I know. I’m doing it for a reason.

Tommy K is a bigger company than GreenCine, and its website does give you some basic info about locations and upcoming videos. But that’s all. It’s a very shallow site, in that there aren’t a lot of pages and some of the information on the home page is not very current. For example, look at the link to the “latest” edition of Tommy.com’s Focus section. Batman Returns, posted July 11, 2005. ‘Nuff said?

GreenCine does also have an excellent web site, where they keep their catalog and where the main business is conducted. It also has a blog, which gives frequent “dispatches” from various film festivals, and some good overviews of the latest films. This is a site that is deep. It has articles going back to May 2003, but as fresh as October 11, 2005. It has links to other blogs, articles, and sites of interest.

(In fact, GreenCine has a second blog, which is newer. That one is their PR and marketing blog, with the latest events at GreenCine.)

Here’s the difference: Tommy K is doing fine, it’s a well-known brand, at least in this area. I’m sure it wouldn’t mind more business, but they don’t seem too hungry. GreenCine is a smaller business. They have to work harder to get your attention. And they do. This blog is a part of their marketing strategy, and it works.

Which are you: Tommy K, or GreenCine? If you’re a small business without a big marketing budget, then you need to start thinking of something other than the basic, boring, static website.

Hmm. What could that be, I wonder?