Blogs have been around for many years but have recently become somewhat a new ‘craze’. A Blog is short for Web Log is basically an online journal. They can be set up at little to no cost at all, and can be used for a wide variety of things. Some bloggers just blog for fun of it, while others tend to use their blogs for business reasons.

The following are just a few ways blogs can be used:

1) Updates Keep customers/clients up to date on changes to your website. Also new product announcement and new related websites.

2) Reviews You can give opinions, advice and personal recommendations on specific products or services related to your field.

3) Personal and Business uses Blogs are a great way to keep track of your goals and plans just by open writing.

4) Stress Reliever Jot down your vents, gripes, thoughts. Some also find general writing therapeutic.

5) Search Engine Optimization Search Engines love text and content. You can also include links to your website which equal backward links which in turn equals high ranking.

6) Money Makers Yes, you can make money with your blog by providing readers with quality copy writing and a few affiliate links.

So how is a blog set up? There are several options you can choose from when starting your own blog, and a few are:

1) Using a free service such as Blogger.com ( http://www.blogger.com ).

2) Using Blogger.com (or other free blog provider) with your own domain name that you can purchase through places such as Mommy’s Helper Domain & Hosting Services ( http://www.mommyshelperonline.com/web-hosting.html ) .

One statistic shows that over 80% of all buying decisions are emotional. That means your copywriting should be, too. This is something I firmly believe in and have preached for most of my copywriting career. However, all too often, I find people skipping vital step of making an emotional connection with their customers. That can be a tragic, and costly, mistake.

That’s why I was excited when I had opportunity to rewrite homepage copy for a vacation cruise service. While copy they used previously gave all details and got them a good number of bookings, it just didn’t have what it takes to make me start daydreaming about my next cruise. It didn’t… but it was about to!

The Problems

The previous copy on Cruise Vacation Center home page faced a couple of challenges. (You can view original copy at this link: http://www.copywritingcourse.com/CruiseVacationCenter-Original.pdf.) The copy was very company-oriented instead of customer-oriented. It talked about who Cruise Vacation Center (CVC) is, why visitor should buy from them, and some wonderful benefits CVC offers its clients including excellent bargain rates and extra discounts. However, all verbiage was geared toward company. The customer was left out.

The home page copy also lacked emotion. It was very matter-of-fact. In addition to making visitors aware of wonderful prices and deals CVC offered, I wanted to create a vision for site visitors. I wanted to give them what they needed in order to float off into a daydream about fabulous ports-of-call; warm, gentle breezes; and thrilling adventures.