How Blogs Influence Purchases More Than Social Networks
Posted on October 30th, 2008 by dhirender
A new study, Harnessing the Power of Blogs, by BuzzLogic and conducted by JupiterResearch, revealed that blogs by creating conversations can have more impact on purchase decisions than social networks. The study also reported an overall 300% growth in monthly blog readership over the past four years. 49% read at least one blog per month and 71% read more than one blog per session.
Some findings:
- 50% of blog readers say they find blogs useful for purchase information.
- More frequent blog readers say they trust relevant blog content for purchase decisions than content from social networking sites.
- For those who have found blog content useful for product decisions, more than half (56%) said blogs with a niche focus and topical expertise were key sources.
- Outside of technology-related purchases, for which 31% of readers say blogs are useful, other key categories include media and entertainment (15%); games/toys and/or sporting goods (14%); travel (12%); automotive (11%); and health (10%).
- As an influence in the purchase process, 21% use blogs to decide on a product or service, 19% use them to refine choices, 19% use them to get support and answers, 17% to discover products and services, 14% as a means os assurance, 13% to inspire a purchase while 7% to execute a purchase.
- Moreover, 25% of the respondents say they trust ads on a blog, compared with 19% who trust ads on social networks.
Clearly, blogs have managed to gain trust and credibity – a rather elusive commodity today. The study also has findings on how blog readers discover new blogs, and tend to read topics across other blogs, which has immense implications for both PR professionals and marketing professionals.
Related posts:
- How Much Does The Internet Influence Our Purchases?
- Information Sources – Who Do We Trust? Not Blogs …
- Why Do People Read Blogs?
- Can You Ignore Social Media Anymore?
- Are Social Networks Evil?
Filed under: Digital culture
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