It’s not easy to manage a blog when you run a company. Unless you started out blogging, most businesses that we come in contact with would rather pay to have it done for them than struggle with their own blog. It’s not hard, though, and the heaviest factor seems to be whether or not you’ll develop the discipline to do it. That said, disciplines take some effort and forethought. Blogging is no different.
Once you make a commitment to blog, make another commitment to blog consistently. On the low end, blogging once a week is a minimal performance requirement. You’ll really trip the trigger if you start to blog a couple of times a week. If you can update your website with good content daily, well, you’re unstoppable. It gets to be a good habit, and good habits have good results.
Blogging more frequently will:
- Improve your communication skills
- Cause more frequent indexing by search engines
- Add page depth to your business website, giving it strong online ‘legs’ that don’t lose their ground when algorhythms change
- Keep you in tune with your audience
- Cause you to become intentional about a strategy
Results aren’t immediate. You won’t be the first one who blogs for months with little or no engagement at first. The big results come over time, as you learn to tweak your message and improve. Don’t give up, it’s easy to start to look at your efforts with some frustration when you’ve worked very hard and can’t prove it was worth it.
But that’s when you’ll get really good.
When you’re sick of feeling like your efforts are being wasted, you’ll understand why sharing your blog on social media is a good idea. You’ll realize that now you have information others really need, and wonder if your titles could improve. You’ll think about using an email service to share your website content more directly with people who already trust your business, but need to be reminded you exist. You’ll start suggesting your blog for more information when the phone rings and you didn’t quite secure the sale.
There’s something about diligence that really matters when it comes to blogging. Blogging can be a purchased service, but we always try to get businesses to incorporate blogging into their regular office routines. Here are a few suggestions I give people to encourage them:
- Jot down notes in a notebook you keep in your car, or use the notes feature on your smartphone
- Remember the questions people ask on the phone that you wish you answered better
- Respond to your most frequent request for information
- Spend 10 minutes a day ‘free writing’
- Give everyone in the company the task of writing a paragraph or bullet points on a topic they could address, and then assign someone to write about them
If you’re not blogging, start with one a week for a month, even if you write several ahead of time. Those routines are good for you. As you get comfortable producing more material, up your game to a couple a week. Frequent blogging makes a huge difference, and you’ll be amazed at the results. New stuff is hard to adjust to, but now isn’t the time to say “writing is too hard for me,” especially when you notice your phone is ringing more frequently when you do it.
Learn more about why your content is important. Let’s pull out all the stops when it comes to free marketing. Make a commitment to protect your website search engine rank, help your visitors choose your company over the competition, and inform the public about your great products and services. For FREE.
Trust me, you need to blog more.
Are you seeing results from blogging? Why or why not do you think so?
