It might feel like what you have to do for marketing changes daily. There’s always a new way of using keywords and there are always new social media you just have to be a part of. We get it; it can be overwhelming.
However, a business blog can be an easy and fun way to communicate with your customers. Your business blog shouldn’t feel like a chore. It’s just a fun way to communicate and provide useful information to your customer.
One of the biggest no-nos that businesses fall into when creating their business blog posts is thinking about sales. Your blog shouldn’t be about sales. Oh, and be sure to get rid of corporate speak. No one wants to read that.
Your blog is about providing useful information to customers and having a conversation with people who are interested in your product.
Answer the questions customers are asking
When you think about what to write about on your business blog, think about what questions your customers often ask. What information do your customers want?
By providing answers on your blog to questions that customers frequently ask, you’re offering something useful to customers. Your customers will see your blog as authoritative and helpful, meaning they’ll likely come back for more.
Make it easy: Create a content calendar
Knowing what you’re going to post and when can make blogging for business much easier. When you’re facing a blank page and a blinking cursor, writing a blog is tough. Having a ready-to-go idea for what you’re going to write makes it a much more pleasant experience.
If you create the content calendar in Google suite or upload it to the cloud, your employees can look at it and add ideas. This makes coming up with ideas more collaborative and much easier.
Write about what matters to your company
Your company has a culture; show it on the blog. Write about what matters to your company and to your employees.
Potential new hires when looking for a job will also likely visit your blog. By showing a little personality, you’re likely to recruit better talent that relates well to your company’s established culture.
Use multimedia
A great business blog post isn’t just words. Make sure to include multimedia periodically. This might mean adding in videos, photos, charts, graphs, GIFs, or any other digital addition.
Marinate on blog post ideas
When writing a business blog, don’t just spout your ideas. Marinate and plan before writing a business blog post. It’s important to let ideas formulate, so you can articulate them in the best, most readable way.
Outline
We know this is the least fun part, but it can really help to direct thoughts and make a better post.
The outline for your business blog can make it much easier to articulate ideas and create a readable post. Try to break up the writing process by outlining the post one day, take some time to think about, and then write the post the next day.
Have a brand style and voice
When writing a business blog post, be sure to have in mind who you are writing to. Before blogging for business, consider your ideal customer. That’s your reader! You should always be writing directly to that person.
Many business blogs create a persona or two to help them more easily write in a consistent tone. If more than one person will be writing blog posts, a persona and a style guide help to keep the voice of the blog consistent over time.
Humanize the corporation
Customers today aren’t interested in working with giant, faceless corporations. By personalizing your blog, being honest, and having a voice, you’re reminding customers that your company isn’t a corporation. It’s a group of people working towards the same goal.
Show your humanity n your business blog and you’re more likely to attract customers.
Grab attention
When posting a blog for business, don’t just slap on the first title that comes to mind. Take some time to come up with something creative that will grab readers’ attention.
In the world of content, you have to stand out. Using a catchy title is one of the easiest ways to do just that.
Make sure you also create interesting blog posts. Try to think about what would interest your customers, and don’t be afraid to break away from the traditional content at times. Consider having posts featuring employees, discussing what’s happening at the office, or even commenting on pop cultures such as award shows or popular sports events.
Be reputable
This is a big one to be careful of. When you write a post and use a statistic, be sure to link to the original source.
You want to establish yourself as knowledgeable and a place where readers can come to answer questions. But to do that, you must be reputable.
Share the love
Sometimes blogging for business can feel like you’re shouting into the void. An easy way to avoid this is to link to other businesses that write great blogs, provide useful information, or wrote an article that you think might be useful to your customers.
Remember, business blogs aren’t about sales or competition. Don’t be afraid to share the love and link to other businesses. Link to others and they’ll link back, increasing your number of readers and possibly customers.
Read and edit
A major mistake when blogging for business is not reading over or editing posts.
Your business blog post should be edited for grammar and clarity. Have someone else on staff (or a few people) read the post before sending it out, or try reading it aloud to yourself. This is a great technique for editing.
Another thing to consider is readability. If your blog is targeted towards a niche group, it might be ok to use some jargon, but you want even the most beginner of readers to be able to read and understand your blogs. Use short words and a clear thesis to make sure readers keep reading.
Thoughtful length
There’s no hard and fast rule for how long a post should be. Some business blogs have posts that are 500 words, some over 1000 words. The trend is moving towards longer posts, but that doesn’t mean that you should force content to be longer than necessary.
The content should dictate the length of the post. Trust the content and don’t force it to be too condensed or stretch it out too long.
White space!
Readability isn’t just about grammar and content; it’s also about white space.
Good online content is scannable, with subheads and short paragraphs. This blog is a great example of the use of white space and scannability.
Not everyone who reads your blog post will have the time to invest in reading every word. Make it easy for the reader to understand the major ideas just by scanning through the content in a few minutes. (Seriously, how many of you are scanning right now? Meta!)
SEO and keywords
Use ’em!
We know: SEO and keywords are boring. And we agree. Keywords should be natural (yes, we’re using them in this blog!) and shouldn’t stand out to readers. Blogging for business doesn’t mean that content should be stilted and fake. When posting a blog for your business, be authentic with your readers and provide useful content. SEO and keywords should fit naturally into your business blog.
Have companions
When you post a business blog, don’t just release it out into the endless abyss that is the internet. Create companions to go with your blog posts in the form of social media posts.
Different types of content
Your business blog posts don’t always have to be the same. Consider having different types of content to keep the feeling of your business blog fresh. You can have evergreen content that never expires, buzzy content that attracts attention, informational content that tells customers about new products, and updates that provide information about the company.
Easy to share
If you want people to read your post (you do, don’t you?), make sure it’s easy to share. Use share buttons so your readers can send it to their friends or save it to read later.