What lessons from "The Blog that Saved a Business"?

A recent edition of the NAWBO SmartBrief email newsletter used the headline "Cookie maker's blog revived her flagging sales" and linked to a story in the Star Tribune about Katherine Novotny's experience in turning around her business by blogging about its impending shutdown.

One week later, Katie was able to write a Thank You, St. Paul!!! post and announce that St. Paul Classic Cookie Co. had "made it through."

Did Katie's blog save her business?

No, I don't think the blog itself saved the cookie shop. Looking at her archives, Katie has been blogging sporadically since July 2006. Most of the posts prior to the crisis (only 6 in 2006 and 7 in all of 2007) are basically ads for Katie's products, recipes, specials, and the like.

Then, Katie used her blog to do what blogs do best: she engaged with her readers on a personal level.

With business blogs, this includes your customers and your network of contacts. Katie's experience is a classic case of online and offline results. First, her fellow downtown business owner, Lisa Cotter Metwaly, owner of the Q Kindness Cafe, forwarded the story via email to others like Michael Belaen of the St. Paul Chamber of Commerce and a downtown e-newsletter with 3400 subscribers. Another friend from a local networking group, Linda LaBarre, a professional organizing consultant, took it upon herself to distribute flyers downtown on Katie's behalf.

I point out all the time that nobody ever got fired for blogging, though a handful have been fired for doing something stupid on their blog. Similarly, I'd argue that Katie didn't save her business just by having a blog, but by doing something very smart on her blog. She used it to engage with her customers and friends the same way she would if talking to them face to face in her shop or at a networking event.

Over at the Small Company Big Image blog, Katie is quoted as saying,

"Enough people responded that we were able to pay our bills, meet our deadlines and stay open. And we were also able to talk to our customers so they understood why we raised our prices the next week."

The second sentence contains the key. Her blog post enabled her "to talk to her customers so they understood" her business.

The lessons? Use your business blog as a tool for connecting on a personal level. And don't wait until you're about to close the doors to get started.

Comments

[Social Network Web Design]

Lately, more and more businesses realize the benefits of using social networking sites/tools to promote their business. Almost everybody is connected to another because of these sites, so why not businesses reach out to their customers thru social networking too.

[Katie Novotny]

When I wrote that blog post back in March of 2008 I had no idea what the response would be. Unaware of the blog post going viral, I was completely astonished by the generous support of the community who came out to help us when we needed it most.

Thanks to Lisa Cotter Metwaly at the Q Kindness Cafe, Michael Belean of the St. Paul Chamber of Commerce, Linda LaBarre and Ashley Olds of Organize Life, and the St. Paul community, we are still here today, a year later.

Not only has our blog allowed us to connect with our customers and community, we are using Facebook and Twitter as well.

Not only have we been able to connect with new customers, we have also been able to connect with other local and independent businesses as well.

Networking and social media are just the kind of tools that are hard to quantify, but they are necessary for business survival.

I think you bring up some great points, it is tough to figure out your ROI on networking and social media, but I think when something happens like this, it shows us how imperative it is for us to connect with one another, on a human and very interpersonal level in order to not only to survive, but to be successful.

If there were ever a time networking and social media were needed, it would be now. During this kind of economic climate, we need each other now more than ever.