1. 5 Reasons Your Company
Should Be Blogging
{
Business Blogging
Made Easy
2. In the beginning…
{
BLOG: A Web site on which an individual or group of users
record opinions, information, etc. on a regular basis.
3. Today…
{
A blog is essentially an on online platform that helps you reach out to
consumers by talking about things that are of interest to them and will
peak their curiosity… and hopefully your business.
5. {
1. Build a Team Mentality
We, as humans, like to be part of a movement. We want to
be part of a team. When all hands are on deck and each
person is contributing to building the company’s
content base, magic and momentum can truly happen,
and all benefit together.
Whether you’re an army of 1, 5 or 500, working as a team
to produce content can have a powerful effect on any
company or organization.
7. {
2. Keep Your Sword Sharpened
• Blogging forces you to stay up to date with every new
technology in your industry.
• You become much better at explaining things in a way
that consumers can clearly understand. (In other words,
you learn how to become a better teacher and
communicator.)
• You increase the ability to answer questions a
customer could throw at you.
• Writing a blog post is like practicing for a game. The
more one practices, the better their skills, timing and
overall play—which ultimately leads to more victories, or
in most case, sales.
9. {
3. Become a Trust Agent
• When it comes to blogging, the process of making
connections with your customers is not nearly as
complicated as we sometimes make it. Look at it this
way:
Helpful Content = Trust
Trust = Leads
Leads = Sales
10. {
3. Become a Trust Agent
• Do you remember your kindergarten teacher? (Yes, I
know that was a long time ago, but try.) How did he or
she make you feel? Did you trust him/her?
• Most of us love our earliest teachers – Why? The
biggest reason is because they took the time to
patiently teach us things in a way we could actually
understand.
• That’s right; they weren’t there to impress anyone, as
their only goal was helping us understand.
• When a company’s blog takes on this “kindergarten
content” approach, they do everything in their power to
answer customer questions by seeing the world from
the consumer’s point of view, not their own.
• Once this occurs, walls of doubt are torn down and the
trust level between the customer and the company
immediately starts to go up.
12. {
4. Build a Better Business
Companies that blog have far better marketing results.
Specifically, the average company that blogs has:
55% more visitors
97% more inbound links
434% more indexed pages
13. {
4. Build a Better Business
Why are website visitors important?
Because more visitors means more people to convert to
leads or sales.
Why are inbound links important?
Because they signal authority to search engines, thus
increasing your chances of getting found on search
engines.
Why are indexed pages important?
The more pages you have on your site, the better your
chances of getting found on search engines.
15. {
5. Reach vs. Expense
• Blogging is both relatively simple and highly cost-
effective. Blogs are assets that are extremely well suited
for the needs of businesses as they desire to maximize
visibility and minimize costs. When integrated with other
social media platforms such as Facebook or Twitter
through links and references, blogs can serve to further
an even greater awareness and allow businesses to
reach an even wider audience.
• Blogs provide the ability to connect with clients on a less
formal basis, one of the primary drivers of Social Media.
In addition to this blogs are also very useful from a
traditional Search Optimization perspective, the ability to
write on various topics related to the business is an
ideal method to increase the number of potential linking
partners and therefore build the web site
Authority factor over time.
16. 5 Reasons You Might
Not Be Blogging
{
How to overcome workplace roadblocks and
myths
18. {
1. Takes Time Away from Other Duties
Yes, it probably does. Blogging takes time. But a boss who
is airing this grievance is a sign you haven't sufficiently
sold the importance of business blogging.
Selling points:
• 92% of companies who blog multiple times per day
have acquired a customer from their blog. 66% of
marketers who blog once a week have acquired a
customer, too!
• 70% of marketers are blogging at least once a week.
Probably because they're all getting customers from it.
• 52% of marketers who blog say it delivers the
lowest CPL of all other marketing channels.
Once you've convinced your boss, you have some options.
Either keep doing it yourself, as part of a team approach
or…. outsource it.
20. {
2. Your Boss Wants to Review Everything
Bosses are busy. If everything has to be approved before it
goes out, you're going to suffer a huge bottleneck. You’ll
spend more time chasing them down, asking them if they
could please read that post you gave them two weeks ago.
Solutions:
Agree that it’s important to have another person review blog
content before it gets published ... But ask your boss if a
colleague can be trained on the approval process instead.
Because when a colleague reviews content, it's more of a
team effort, as opposed to an annoying task that keeps
clogging up your boss' calendar. You and your colleague will
enjoy a shared success when your blog takes off. And when
you're relying on one another to complete a project together,
that bottleneck disappears, because your success is tied to
one another's productivity.
21. Not blogging?
{
3. Your Legal Counsel Needs to Review Everything
22. {
3. Your Legal Counsel Needs to Review Everything
Getting over this common hurdle comes down to advance
preparation. Here's what you can do.
• First, ask your legal team to do a little upfront work. They
should write down guidelines that dictate what can -- and
more important, what cannot -- be published in your blog
content. Ask them to provide examples of each so you truly
understand the nuances of their requirements.
• Create an editorial calendar of blog topics. Send this to
your legal team, and ask them to approve and reject topics,
adding notes next to each topic of anything they think the
writer should beware of to sidestep legal landmines.
23. Not blogging?
{
4. You Forgot to Mention This, That, and the Other Thing
24. {
4. You Forgot to Mention This, That, and the Other Thing
That's why internal linking was invented.
Make sure your company's internal blogging “roadblockers”
understand the concept that blog posts should focus on
shorter, more specific topics.
Save some of that content and you’ll also struggle way less to
come up with more blog topics to write about later down the
road!
26. {
5. Your Blog Does Not Sound on Brand
Inconsistency in the style, tone, and even grammar of your
content is fair game for roadblockers, especially in larger
organizations. And if you have more than one person in
charge of content creation, it's made even more difficult.
Solutions:
Get everyone on the same page with a content style guide.
A style guide for your written content will ensure everyone
creating content is playing by the same rules, and gives
everyone one place to consult for their questions ... whether
about the decision to hyphenate a word, or whether their
audience would truly appreciate that joke you want to make in
the last paragraph of your post.
28. {
1. Set Up an Editorial Calendar
Many people suffer not from writer's block, but from topic
block. In fact, often writer's block is a symptom of a crappy
topic. If you start writing and find yourself struggling, go back
to the topic and ask yourself if it's focused enough and
relevant enough for your target audience.
Create an editorial calendar, or at the very least, a topic list
that you can reference every time you sit down to blog. It can
be as simple as a spreadsheet with a topic, working title, and
notes on what you'd like to cover in the post. Add to it
whenever a great idea pops into your head, which could
literally happen at any time.
29. Tactics for Faster Business
Blogging
{
2. Require other Team Members to Contribute
30. {
2. Require other Team Members to Contribute
• Have a requirement that each employee (related to
marketing efforts) contributes to the blogging content topic
list. Or in a smaller business, ask each member of your
company to contribute one or two posts each month.
• You'll probably encounter some people who aren't natural
bloggers, and that's okay! Have them at least run topics by
you as suggestions.
• Remind those struggling that not only is this an important
skill they're building, but also that content doesn't have to
be long, complicated, or forced. Just write like you speak,
about what you know, and edit afterward for clarity.
• REMEMBER TO BUILD THE TEAM MENTALITY
32. {
3. Stop Worrying About Length
• Many people get tripped up over how much they're writing.
The truth is, most people hate reading.
• People coming to your blog have a million other things they
could be doing with their time, but they're there on your
blog to learn something very specific. The easier you make
that process (AKA the less time it takes), the happier they'll
be.
34. {
4. Answer a Common Question
• If you're on the front lines with prospects and customers
every day, consider one, just one, question you get
frequently.
• Write a quick answer to that question just like it's an FAQ,
and publish that to your blog. You're being helpful,
providing valuable content, and it doesn't have to be long
or require any research... because all of the knowledge is
already in your head, and you probably already repeat this
answer every single day!
35. Tactics for Faster Business
Blogging
{
5. Publish Other Kinds of Content
36. {
5. Publish Other Kinds of Content
• Some days it simply isn’t going to happen.
• Instead publish alternative content. An infographic, industry
related cartoon, slideshow, or video? These types of
content are not only well received by readers and
frequently shared, but they require nothing more than a
quick intro in way of writing.
38. {
5. Outsource It
• When all else fails, just outsource your needed content.
• Tap into freelance copywriters elsewhere that specialize in
your industry. Just make sure you screen the writers in
advance to ensure they are high quality writers who are
knowledgeable in your industry.
39. Reasons Why Blogging Is Still
Important for 2013
{
1. It’s Socially Foundational
40. {
1. It’s Socially Foundational
• Just because a lot of the conversation is moving off of
blogging platforms doesn’t mean that you should abandon
ship. A blog allows you to create a base in which all of your
work is anchored.
• As cool as it is, you cannot fully explain yourself on Twitter.
• A blog allows you to build a fuller picture of who you are.
Most people will meet you through other places… but if
they like what they read on Twitter, then they’ll follow you
back to your blog and find out more about who you are.
41. Reasons Why Blogging Is Still
Important for 2013
{
2. You Build Your Brand As An Expert
42. {
2. You Build Your Brand As An Expert
• Successful marketing bloggers command attention and
garner interesting results by influencing trends, creating
breakthrough ideas and giving its customers the best
information out there.
• Successful bloggers don’t focus on themselves. They focus
on publishing relevant content that puts their talent and
knowledge on display, while simultaneously giving the
customers something they can use. Being an expert is not
talking about yourself.
44. {
3. You Build Trust
People are skeptical. They are skeptical about strangers on
the street and they are even more skeptical about strangers
on the internet. A blog with consistent, truthful and helpful
content will allow you to bridge that gap between distrust to
trust.
How do you build trust?
• Clean and beautiful design
• Correct spelling and grammar
• High-quality photo of the author
• Signs of social sharing
• Links to trustworthy sources
• High-quality images and visuals
• Short, easy-to-read domain name
• Professional logo
• Solid, detailed content updated frequently
46. {
4. You Get to Be Creative
You might wonder why creativity is important in a world where
business and hard-hitting metrics seem to dominate, but the
answer is simple: in any competitive field it is the most
creative who will succeed.
Here’s how:
• Create content that stirs up conversation and communities
that generate new ideas
• Blogging can reduce stress as you work out ideas or
problems that might be weighing on your mind
• The process of blogging unlocks hidden ideas in your own
mind, leading to insights
• Helps you maintain a focus on what needs to get done.
• But ultimately, blogging will lead to growth as you learn
about yourself, your audience and the world around you…
leading to further creativity and profitable insights.
48. {
5. Organic Search Traffic
• Blogging improves your organic search engine efforts,
which in turns drives more traffic to your site.
• And when people show up to your site and find well-
reasoned and useful content, they are going to learn more
about your services.
• As more posts increase, your overall site traffic will
increase also. In other words, accumulating posts on your
site over time is like a snowball growing in size as it rolls
down the hill.
• More content you have the more likely you are going to
have something that a reader wants.
• Why not try and give it to them?
49. {
David Caldwell
balancecreative.net/blog
david@balancecreative.net
859.381.9510
