It has been suggested for years that I begin to blog for our company. Laughing *loudly* at even the suggestion of this, I have always shrugged it off as something you leave to the professionals. Are you kidding me? I am the first to admit that I break every punctuation and grammar rule that there is. Sometimes I just break the rules to break them; I have never really been a rule follower. I am an entrepreneur—it's in my nature to think and do differently.
Because things change so quickly in our industry (literally several times a day), I refer to my morning coffee as my continuing education time with Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Most of the information I read are from thought leaders, industry experts, and colleagues—through their blogs.
It just dawned on me (light bulb moment): blogs are pretty flipping important!! I read so many blogs throughout the day I find myself being a harsh blog critic. But I've never really critiqued my own company blog. I had people who took care of that for me. BIG MISTAKE! The content is horrible—I am embarrassed: it isn't even in our company voice, it comes across to me as a school report (BORING), and most importantly it lacks personality. OMG—my company had the type of blog I despised! It lacked a purpose and most importantly our voice.
I am always fascinated by how well some companies do with their blogs, like HubSpot or one of our most recent re-design clients, ReachForce. They are phenomenal with engaging me, and they practice what they preach. They have a company voice. Kudos to them; they 'get it.' I believe it is never too late to change or improve. Maybe we have missed a few opportunities, I can't change that. I can only make sure it doesn't happen in the future.
Here are 3 good reasons for you to blog for your company:
- If you don't know this by now, content rules—meaning it rules the Internet. The Internet is where people turn instinctively when they are looking to research topics, products and services. We've all heard the phrase "I don't know, Google it!"
- Most organic search results in the top 3 positions are blog articles. If you are paying for search engine traffic, this is reason enough to start a blog.
- If you are not producing content regularly, your website is stale, out of date, not relevant, and forgotten—which means you are probably not getting many visitors to your site (period!). It is that simple. Inbound marketing is about creating quality content people want to read.
The first step to blogging for your business is to find your company voice. (If you haven't figured it out by now, our voice is exactly how we are: conversational, consultative, and casual)
Here are some other tips to get you motivated and started today:
- If you have a company blog, READ IT.
- Speak to the reader as if they are already a customer, friend, or colleague.
- Management needs to blog. You know your company better than anyone. You are the expert.
- Blogging should be a big part of your web strategy, and it should represent your business accurately in your voice. Don't try to be something you're not. Write for your customers who you enjoy working with, and who adore you for being who you are. Remember, it's ok to not attract clients who you won't work well with—actually this should be your goal. ;-)
- Blogs need variety. Identify knowledgeable people within your organization to be a part of your company voice. Think of the person you are always leaning to for answers—the person who your customers are always calling for advice.
- Consider hiring an inbound marketing professional to inspire you, coach you (and your team), and help you identify opportunities so you will show up in the SERPs with interesting topics people are looking for. It is also a good idea to have them review posts before you publish for maximum results.
- Consider reciprocal blogging by inviting guest bloggers to contribute to your blog (hopefully you will do the same for them).
If this article has inspired you to start blogging, I would encourage you to drop your first blog article link in the comment field. I promise to stop by and say hi!
