Business blogging is now recognised as a valuable tool in achieving a number of online marketing initiatives, such as attracting targeted search engine traffic, acting as a hub for all your social media marketing and last but not least providing an excellent platform for publishing new and archived content that demonstrates your expertise.

As with any successful marketing activity that proves its mettle, business blogging has now been adopted by businesses of all sizes to strengthen their online marketing arsenal. The question now is not so much ‘would my business benefit from running a blog’, but instead ‘how do I make my blog stand out from the crowd?’

The starting point for any successful blog is a workable content marketing strategy. Simply put, this is a plan which outlines a schedule for sourcing, preparing and publishing content to your blog on a regular basis. The following ideas are intended to enhance your content marketing strategy and help hone your business blogging skills.

1. Never Forget Content remains King
It’s not always the best looking blogs that win the day; it’s the blog that can consistently deliver the right kind of content. As mentioned, key to any successful blog is a workable plan for publishing regular content that appeals to and engages with your target audience. Blog post topics could include:

• A series of posts addressing a specific well known issue.
• Reviewing news items either adapted from general news stories or industry specific news.
• Hosting a product review – which could involve video footage.
• Featuring short excerpts from industry reports along with your own findings
• News and views from industry events and trade shows

Keeping an eye on news and social media feeds will help keep you abreast of the latest trends and very often trigger ideas for new posts.

2. Somebody Behind The Blog
An advantage small to medium sized businesses have over big faceless corporations is the ability to not be faceless. To share something of themselves which personalises and humanises the person or people behind the blog.

This doesn’t mean talking about what your dog had for breakfast, it means sharing some personality. Blogging – as with social networking activities – is about being part of a community, engaging with others on a personal as well as professional level.

3. What’s In a Blog Post Title?
When preparing an email marketing campaign it is critical to spend time preparing a compelling email subject line. It’s the subject line after all that determines whether the recipient will bother opening the email. Similarly, your blog post headline needs to appeal to your target audience in the right way. The internet is a content rich environment; persuasive content headings play a vital part in helping your blog stand out from the crowd and encouraging readers to engage with you.

4. Cross Reference Your Content
Don’t be afraid to blow your own trumpet a little. If you have shared some expert knowledge in previous posts which can help throw additional light on elements of your latest post, link to it from within your content. This not only helps show off your expertise, it can also make your blog more interesting to readers – and the search engines.

Additional features such as ‘you may also be interested in...’ lists at the end of your post can keep readers on your blog for longer and establish you as an authority in your field.

5. Make It Easy To Connect
Finally, show confidence in the quality of your content by having numerous ways for readers to subscribe to your blog. This can be done by an email or RSS feed subscription, or even via your social media properties. The social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter can also be an excellent way to encourage readers to share your content with their group of friends and colleagues.

In conclusion, publishing a business blog will provide many opportunities for engaging with your online customers – especially if you can make it interesting enough. If you would like help implementing a blog for your business, call us on 08450 740068.