The recent spurt of interest in blogging has begun to ignite hope that people can make a full-time income from blogging.

Although there are a few people actually doing this, there aren't too many business models yet that can support someone making a full-time income from their blogs.

I believe that blogs should be an important part of any traffic-generation plan for a website, but don't depend on blog itself to do much selling.

Blogs are best viewed as an addition to site content, in reality, a very simple content management system that helps you update your site more frequently, so your search engine listings and traffic increase.

Email campaigns are still best way to produce sales on demand and to announce specials and time-limited offers, because blogs do not yet have immediacy and reach of email.

Blogs are not about selling anyway. As an internet marketer and publisher, I find that blogs can be an excellent tool to support your main business, to provide value, build relationships with prospective customers and to build your personal brand and image.

For corporates and small businesses, blogs can help put a human face on an otherwise bland business site. In corporate world, blogs are being for internal communication and knowledge management, and for brand building and public relations campaigns.

Nike's Art of Speed blog is an excellent example of subtle brand building using blogs. http://www.gawker.com/artofspeed

As an internet marketer and publisher, here are some ways you can use blogs to support your business.

1. Write reviews of products in your field

The question of day is "Should you start a Blog?"

People all over planet are blogging. Companies, CEOs, lawyers, journalists, stewardesses. Even dogs and babies.

Why? Because they can. It's that simple.

Blogging requires little or no learning curve. If you can type, speak into a phone, bark, chew, record a holiday movie, you can blog.

Blogs have taken publishing out of domain of those who know HTML and designing, to make this powerful tool available to rest of us.

That holiday in Far East, your grandma's birthday, you company's latest product offering, your new recipe for rum cake, your daughter's first step, your pet's antics, what you thought of Garfield movie - you can blog all this and more.

A blog is an online journal or diary. Which makes it ideal for voicing your opinion, recording your pregnancy blahs or announcing your company's latest acquisition.

People are using them to communicate with family, for education, for business, and almost anything else you can think of.

But one thing not all blogs get is a readership.

Unless your blog is only for your family or your business colleagues, you're probably writing with hope that someone will read about what you think.

So many blogs are started with little or no purpose. If you want to blog and survive, first start by answering your why.

If you're writing only for search engine spiders, then be prepared for no one but them to read your keyword-rich spam.

Blogs demand a readership. And for that you have to write about something worth reading.

Here are some tips to follow if you want human beings to read your blogs.

1. Stay on topic