Strategic Marketing and Charleston PR » Blogs

Ten spot-on ways to develop articles for your business blog

Connection Maven — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 15:26:53 +0000

If you are writing a blog for your business, you need to stay focused on the goals you set when you decided to begin. Was it to demonstrate your firm’s experience and capabilities or was it to help search engine results by providing keyword rich posts that also demonstrate your businesses’ knowledge?

Hopefully the later is your goal. So here you are, committed or not to the blog and you are short of ideas. These ten ideas will help you write interesting blog posts even when your creative muse has gone on vacation.

Look to the news of the day; are there any major news items that impact some aspect of your businesses core competencies? If so, write about how and why. Google News has a robust search feature which allows you to hone in on your most significant keywords.
Look to your interactions with your clients. Did you have any “teachable moments” or interactions in the past few days that you feel are common and which, when shared, can provide learning opportunities? If yes, write about those moments; be sure to keep the names of those you mention and identifying comments discrete. You don’t want to embarrass your clients or yourself.
Write about some of the “basics” of your business. It is always good to refresh yourself on core competencies and share fresh insights as to why these basics are so important.
Write about management issues affecting your business. Each business has issues that are common to them all and often generalize to others in the industry.
Look to trends in your industry and analyze how one of them may affect clients in your industry.
If your blog is client facing, write about new developments that are sure to produce results for them. Tell why.
Invite another industry / sector expert to be a guest blogger. They can write about their insights into key issues in your industry.
Share a client success story (with permission of course.) Tell why they succeeded and if you were a part of that success, help readers see how and why the client succeeded.
Share a major learning experience; an Ah-ha moment. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be bullet proof…just healed. So say how and why you got insight that helped you redirect.
Share information about your colleagues or employees or even new staff member news, awards and competencies. I would even suggest having one of your employees write a guest post. Invite them to share some of their personality and talents they bring to working with you.

Bloggers influence grows, tops social media

Connection Maven — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:59:00 +0000

Bloggers are influential. A study reports that 50% of those who report reading blogs, trust them for their evaluations of products. And of those using blogs to evaluate products, 52% of respondents said that blogs tipped their decision on which product to purchase at the time of their purchase.

Given their growth as influencers, the FTC has outlined new rules to help consumers understand the relationships between bloggers and the products that they review. Bloggers who review products that have been provided to them gratis or who have been compensated must inform consumers of their relationship to the product manufacturers or providers.f

While the number of adults who read blogs has grown by 300% in the past four years, blogs are not quite mainstream yet in terms total audience. There are generational differences in who reads and writes. Younger readers are disproportionately those who visit and write blog posts. Older internet surfers constitute almost half the 35-44 year old group.

So, if your company has a mix of media to deliver information about your services and products, you need to be sure to include blogging in the mix, especially if your audience is 45 and under.

Are bloggers important?

Connection Maven — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 17:00:00 +0000

Recently I was working on a publicity campaign for the launch of a new business. The plans for publicity called for the new business to share information with conventional media and bloggers.

Someone asked me, “Are bloggers important?” My reply, “Yes.” Sharing your news directly with those who start conversation is the best way to reach targeted persuaders.

Many old school types can’t see the power of blogging, they don’t read blogs or use them as a forum and there is not a really good way, yet, to measure the power of a blog. (If you know of one, do tell me!) Oldies know blogs exist, but it’s like the feelings that advertisers had ten years ago about the Hispanic and Latino market, “why bother?” And now that the other shoe has dropped on that market, we clearly understand the importance of the Hispanic and Latino markets.

Here’s why bother, about blogs that is. Bloggers and their readers are conversationalists who are sharing, posting, inquiring and recommending on a daily basis. Not only that, they are Twittering, FaceBooking, and, yes, even MySpacing to their contacts. Not only are bloggers opinions real, they are searchable.

Google is caching pages with your company’s name, your products and your press releases.

This isn’t just my opinion, but is the reality of the merged world of marketing and PR.

I’ve been reading, How the Web Has Changed the Rules of Marketing and PR by David Meerman Scott and I am especially impressed with his statement about the change.

“With blogs, we communicate directly with our audience, bypassing the media filter completely. We have the power to create our own media branding the niche of our own choosing. It’s about being found on Google and Yahoo! and vertical sites and RSS feeds.”

So, if you have not started a blog, not read a blog, or don’t have one on your company site, today’s the day.