ClickZ just covered a study sponsored by our friends at BuzzLogic that says blogs can have more impact on purchase decisions than social networks. The study, conducted by Jupiter, notes that readership of blogs is on the rise with a 300% growth in monthly blog readership in the past four years.
The study highlights blog advertising and says that consumers see bloggers as authorities on specific topics and thus trusts their ads on their blogs. The findings said 40% of people reading blogs have taken action as a result of viewing an ad.
I think the takeaway on how to use this information to boost your online reputation is to 1) start your own blog. Not only will you build yourself as the authority you are, your goal will be to rank for relelvant searches and own your search engine results. 2) start advertising on blogs through Google’s network.