A blog, short for 'web log', is a kind of online diary where people write about their thoughts and ideas, opinions and virtually any other aspect of their lives that other people mind want to read about. Blogging can be a hugely enjoyable hobby, or a means of staying in regular contact with friends and relatives. Increasingly, however, blogging is becoming one of the best ways to make money or to grow traffic to online or offline businesses.

Blogs come in many different designs and formats, some are free to use, some are paid for. Some can be created entirely online, others are created on the user's desktop; some are hosted free by the blog providing company, others use paid for hosting in exactly the same manner as conventional web sites.

Blogs can be simple in design and set up and feature short blog postings hyperlinked to affiliate products the blogger hopes visitors might read about and buy. For low priced products, like eBooks and inexpensive software, a short but professional blog recommendation is usually sufficient to generate a sale.

Alternatively, blogs can be immensely intricate with video and mp3 features highlighting high price products that visitors need to know about in detail before committing themselves to purchase. In such cases a video showing visitors how to use costly traffic generating software, for example, is likely to attract higher sales than a simple text link to an affiliate product supplier's bland and boring sales letter site. That's because, the more costly the item being promoted, the more information potential buyers need about the product, and the more professional a blog must appear to gain trust and confidence of potential buyers.

FEATURES OF BUSINESS BLOGS

Simple or intricate, most business blogs have the following features:

* A title, preferably one that sums up the purpose and content of the blog.

* A body section, usually featuring posts.

* A comments box for visitors to leave messages and comments about the blog.

* Some monetising element such as links to affiliate products, AdSense units, product reviews with links to sites selling those products.

BENEFITS OF BLOGGING FOR BUSINESS OWNERS

* Blogs are easier to learn about and use compared to conventional web sites and usually they include slots into which blog users add their post titles and contents, also keywords and hyperlinks. Compare this to creating a web site which usually means adding your own design elements and sometimes demands extensive knowledge of html.

* Some of the best blogging software is free to use, compared to web sites that can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars from specialist designers and sometimes also hefty fees for domain name and hosting.

* Most blogging platforms provide a selection of templates which can be changed frequently without distorting existing posts and pictures. Changes to conventional web sites, however, can be very costly and very complicated and can mean inputting all design features separately.

* Blogs can have a viral effect where blog owners continuously upload useful information for their enquirers and customers which lead to those people returning often for updates and also recommending others visit the site.

* Users can grow traffic by having their blogs featured in specialist business blog directories and also by linking posts to grow search engine traffic to other sites.

* Many specialist traffic generating methods exist to grow traffic to blogs, including ‘pinging' and also opportunities to register blogs on numerous specialist blog directories.