I love blogging.  Let me say it again – I love blogging.

I love blogging for a number of reasons, but related to business, I love it because I would not be sitting in this chair were it not for a personal wine blog I started two years ago.
In January 2006 I was a technology sales and marketing guy with a nice, albeit safe career.

Creatively, however, I was stagnant.  I’ve always been more proactive than reactive and working for a Fortune 150 company, in large part, was stifling: put your time in, connect the dots, suffer the politics, don’t veer too far to the left, hope your bonus hits and wait for the 3% merit increase.  

Yawn.

So, I started a wine blog (www.goodgrape.com) to simply give myself something creative to do as an outlet.  Mind you, I was simply a guy that lived in the middle of the country that happened to enjoy wine, and I studied it a bit as an enthusiast.  I had and have no special powers and no magic palate.

Two years later I have a nationally recognized wine blog, good traffic, influence in my niche and some amazing things have happened:  First, people seek my opinion out on matters of wine and marketing, frequently.  Two years ago I would have never been qualified to provide a marketing strategy to a wine importer … which I did just prior to joining Compendium.  I’ve been both a winner and a finalist in the American Wine Blog Awards … my site is featured monthly in a wine business magazine called Wine Business Monthly … I have a wine book idea that has been validated by a publisher … The Executive Editor of Wine Spectator has commented on my site.  Celebrity chef Michael Chiarello has commented on my site, numerous winemakers have commented on my site … and, they send me wine samples. Last week I received three wine books in the mail from three different publicists … I am fully networked in the wine industry and able to send dozens of emails to people asking for a favor or a tip, and I would get a helpful response.

Whodathunk?

I bring this up not as a chest-thumping exercise (so please take this with my humility in mind), but because this same opportunity exists for everybody!

We all have expertise in our particular niche and writing authoritatively, consistently and thought-provokingly will lead to success.  Let me say it again – blogging will lead to success for your business.  In fact, you have a greater foundation to build from because you are a business!

The Compendium solution adds that additional “secret sauce” ingredient because developing a blog takes time, cultivating a readership takes time, finding your “voice” takes time.

However, our focus on search engine optimization short circuits through a lot of that cultivation and gives you the ability to drive traffic much quicker than the “slow and steady wins the race” mentality that I had.

There is a real difference between being a “citizen journalist” which I am as a wine blogger and being a business blogger, but there are some shared tenets in terms of creating a sphere of influence and driving to success metrics.  It starts with content and ends with content.  And, Compendium helps you do it the right way.  

But, don’t take my word for it (though you could). Find out for yourself.  Blog consistently with good content for a year and I’ll give you a personal guarantee that your business will be richer for it.  If it’s not, I’ll buy a bottle of wine of your choosing.  In fact, when you realize that your business is better off, I’ll still give you a bottle of wine.  It might be a sample I received, though.