Blogging for business has exploded onto the marketing landscape. Many businesses utilize blogs to promote their services and expertise, others to engage potential and existing client base, and yet other to generate sales leads. Regardless of the objective, launching a blog in the business arena is no small feat. Many businesses have jumped on the social media bandwagon and in the last few years, many have created Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, LinkedIn Business Profile Pages, Pinterest….. and now their very own Blog.
If you’re thinking about creating a blog for your business here’s a few of the hurdles you’ll need to overcome before engaging the blogging arena:
1) Make sure your website can perform accordingly. Many business launch a blog as a separate entity not realizing it’s very beneficial to link their business blog to their website. Blogging can only help the overall traffic your site generates, especially when your posts are featured on your home page, providing Google for a reason to visit your site more frequently. Google looks for fresh and new content. And that traffic can be an opportunity to accumulate leads or at the very least provide information that enables good analysis.
2) Create a strong Blog Persona. Make sure that your blog is an extension of your business and what it represents. Just because it’s social, it doesn’t mean it can’t be branded. It’s part of your brand, so it needs to resonate with your target audience. It also needs to propel your brand forward. It’s a marketing initiative.
3) Be consistent. Be relevant. If you don’t use it, you’ll lose! Many businesses believe that they can do this in-house, and that is certainly doable, but it is a substantial time commitment. Create a social media calendar to ensure that you always have topics in the pipeline that speak to your business. We all get writer’s block or rather, blogging block… but consistency is a must.
4) Write smart. Do your homework. It’s not good enough to just write. It’s important to do your homework. Yes. Homework. Research your topic, and research it with keywords traffic analytics. Make sure your post is SEO enriched. If you write for the pleasure of writing, then you’re just posting and hoping for the best. That’s just not marketing.
5) Spread the word. What’s the point of expending all this energy and time and not sharing your post in the social media properties? You need to tweet about it, post it on Facebook, StumbleUpon, LinkedIn, Google+1, Digg…only to name a few.
After you do it for a while, having a blog for your business can be fun. You start developing a community and a network of like-minded people that speak their minds and provide insight on topics that are relevant to your business. Creating a blog for your business and posting relevant material can elevate your business status and provide you with a strong foundation for developing business. After all, blogging is serious business and done properly should be an integral part of your business marketing program.
What key learning have you found in launching your business blog? I’d like to hear about the different challenges you have been facing with your business blog?