Your company or small business needs a blog. You know that because it is now a necessity to have an online presence to expand your customer base and promote your brand. And blogs are incredibly easy to start, anyone can do it, but do you know how to use it to its maximum effectiveness? Or more importantly, will you avoid the pitfalls so many other business bloggers fall into to prove your internet savvy and distinguish yourself from the rest of the pack? Here are 5 common blog mistakes business bloggers make all to often and some tips on to avoid them.
1. Using A Blog Hosted by a Third-Party. Do not use a blog from, say, wordpress.com, where your domain name will be yourbusiness.wordpress.com and where Wordpress will own all your content. First, these blogs offer much less flexibility in design; secondly, demonstrate a lack of web savvy; and third, will make your blog harder to find. Instead, add a blog onto your website (which you should have already...) using the code readily available at Wordpress.org. Your blog should be an extension of your website, not a separate entity altogether.
2. Writing Your Posts Like Academic Essays. Writing blog posts requires a different kind of writing and mindset. Be less formal -- speak to your readers -- and have some personality to show there's a person, and not a company, behind these posts. The best part about blogs is that they encourage discussion, so write in a way that your readers (and potential customers) will want to comment. Respond to this feedback as well, both literally by responding to pertinent comments and in how your business runs. That said, do NOT neglect proper grammar or spelling, and do not stray far from blogging about business-related topics. Pictures from the company picnic are fine, sure, but do not turn your business blog into a personal diary or a collection of YouTube videos you thought were funny.
3. Just Promoting Your Company or Product. This will be the biggest turn-off to readers. A little promotion is of course necessary, but don't overdo it; use your blog to connect instead. Write about going-ons in your industry and become a trusted (and oft-visited) expert. Talk about new advances or trends. Link to other articles or bloggers in the hopes they'll link back to you. Use your blog as a hub for your other social media, like Facebook and Twitter.
4. Not Posting Often Enough. If you are starting a blog for your small company or business, you need to commit to it. Blogging is certainly a game of quality over quantity, but something still needs to be posted regularly, otherwise, readers will lose interest. Just like any other obligation at the workplace, schedule time to write posts and set deadlines for when they need to be published. Even just a half hour to an hour twice a week will be sufficient for creating content that will help build your readership and keep your current readers paying attention.
5. Assigning Blogging Duties to One Person. It's great that you've found a hip, young staff member up on social media to head up your blog, but do not put one person solely in charge of creating material. Assign duties just occasionally to various members of staff. It will help keep content varied with different voices contributing, allow other aspects of the business to be represented, and give more of a human face to your business -- it's not just one person running everything, right? Most importantly your blog should be an extension of your business; allow those who make your business happen to extend themselves as well.
Joseph Gustav is a guest blogger for An Apple a Day and a writer on the subject of medical transcription training for the Guide to Health Education.
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