Bloggers’ Influence on Consumers Continues to Rise

Forrester Research highlights the growing importance of bloggers in influencing consumer behavior in a new report advising businesses on How to Connect With Bloggers.

Forrester analyst Peter Kim notes that “Marketers no longer dismiss blogs as irrelevant ramblings of pajama-clad geeks. Brands such as OfficeMax and Unilever’s Dove have experienced business lift generated by online chatter.1 On the opposite end of the spectrum, some brands, including Dell and Wal-Mart, have felt the sting of negative blog sentiment.”

Kim says marketers need to formulate a strategy to connect with bloggers because:

• Consumers trust individual opinions over mass advertising.
• Bloggers talk more than their peers about products and purchases.
• Bloggers — especially youth — have money to burn.

Brands desiring to build relationships with bloggers must create personal connections through interpersonal communications — the exact opposite of “one size fits all” mass media techniques used to build brands for the past two centuries, Kim says.