One of the pleasures of a conference is catching up with some of the "names' in your industry. For several years, I've been a devotee of The Blog Squad -- Denise Wakeman and Pasy Krakoff. So it was exciting to meet them in person at the InfoProfit Intensive weekend put on by my coach, Adam Urbanski.

Their presentation reiterated all the benefits I have come to appreciate of having a blog to promote and reinforce my brand and my business.

Let me remind you of the key opportunities having a blog represents:

• getting found quickly by the search engines - blogs are search engine magnets!
• being found by the media - the vast major of media writers turn to the blogosphere to find the experts to interview and quote
• your content is organized by category and available to be found on the Internet forever
• you have the opportunity to create a real conversation with your audience and learn from them

Their secrets to a winning blog -- Pay attention to 4 things:

• Content - make sure you use this platform to position yourself as an Expert, and provide education and resources to the prospective audience you want to reach
• Outreach - engage others with a conversational dialog-encouraging style -- this is not the place to pontificate. Also work on creating relationships with other bloggers who are likely to reciprocate by sending traffic in your direction
• Design - not hugely important, but don't forget that this is yet another way to create perception in the minds of or audience. Look professional; you're not an amateur.
• Action - Get your audience to take action as a result of reading your blog. Decide on your strategic purpose for the blog and then make it happen!

And here is a brief interview with the Blogging Stars themselves (one of the advantages of having my nifty Flip Video on hand)