Corporate Blogging Best Practices Part 2
In our previous post we started with developing personas for your blog audience, planning out content, and ways to do research that would help to round out your corporate blog strategy. Let’s continue the list into a few more areas which are also very important to ensure your blog is worth the time being put into it!
Corporate Blogging Best Practices
Answering Questions
In a B2B environment, often the purpose of blogs will be to answer questions. Broad questions, specific questions, frequently asked questions, etc. So where can you collect these?
- Start with FAQs that have potential to be expanded with as many relevant details as possible. If you haven’t collected a list of these, think out of memory, and then go to your competitor’s websites and collect some from there.
- Another way is to go into your Google Analytics account, browse through search queries people used to find your site, and use those that are already phrased as questions, or those that could be turned into questions. This is a great option since you’re collecting data right from your key audience.
- Another option, if this is available to you, is to ask your clients directly what they would like to know more about, or what information would be helpful when purchasing your product/service, or after purchase.
- Go to social media and industry forums and see what people are discussing. Feel free to chime in with answers if you can link it back to your business in a helpful way. Might as well build the brand while collecting keywords! Platforms to search on a regular basis: Twitter, Facebook groups, LinkedIn, Quora, Reddit.
Have a Consistent Voice
Building a brand requires consistency with action and consistency with voice. If a very clear message isn’t portrayed to your customers, you risk confusing them or worse, turning them away to your competitors. What your company stands for and what you sound like should be fluid with your products/services, and be unique while also making sense for your industry. If your audience is tech savvy, speak the tech language. If they expect a professional tone, deliver it.
Keep Old-But-Still-Relevant Content Updated
If you have some content that will be relevant for a few years or months, something that is more factual or how-to in nature (in comparison to a short-lived news topic), keep an eye on it and update it as industry trends and technology change.
Add new elements, including sub-topics, original photos, and if necessary revise the title.
Be Genuine
People know when you’re faking it and when you’re actually interested and excited about what you’re presenting. Bringing passion and feeling into your content, whatever it may be, is the crucial element in getting people to react and want to convert vs. thinking “so what?” and moving on.
How can you do this?
Highlight the whys behind the company mission. What is the big-picture reason for doing what you do? How are you making your little part of the world better? How are employees contributing, and how do they feel about it? Let them write or share their stories.
If you can’t think of anything, maybe now is the perfect time to start a community project and dedicate a portion of the blog or your YouTube channel to it.
Follow these steps, and the steps from the first corporate blog post, and you’ll be on your way to more loyal customers and better rankings in Google search results.
