Check out the latest data on business blogging from Hubspot’s State of Inbound Marketing report: 65 percent of respondents say that they publish a company blog.

Before you get too excited, two things to keep in mind:

• Adoption of blogging as a business tool only grew four percent from 2010 to 2011.
• These are likely mostly larger companies and/or Web-savvy smaller ones. Why? Because the latest State of Small Business Report finds that only 8 percent of respondents use  blogs–and only 19 percent said that they update their Web site “at least once a week.”

In other words, the companies that understand what a blog can do for your business (thought leadership, lead generation, etc.) are doing it. The rest: not so much. While the data suggests that having a blog is a competitive differentiator for any business, it’s especially true if you’re a small business.

A colleague of mine said the other day:

“I think blogs are almost like business cards used to be.”

What say you?