Today, more than ever, business owners are sharing their personal lives in their blog and social media posts. Despite fears of mixing business and personal, entrepreneurs are finding that their followers love seeing a more “real” side to business. Whether you want to call it authenticity, being genuine, or simply being you, it doesn't matter - being personal attracts others to you (and to your business!).
Are you getting the most out of your blog?
The thing is, blogging takes a lot of time, brainpower, and creativity. Those resources are in high demand as a small business owner, and frankly, I don’t want you to waste them! When you think about your blog, are you doing it just because you feel like you have to? Or do you have a clear strategy that guides you on what you need to do to make your blog work for you and boost your business?
As you read through this blog post, take an honest look at your blog. Ask yourself what you could be doing to leverage your blog to leverage your business. Not only will it help you get a better ROI, but it will help you serve your customers more effectively!
As a small business owner, your biggest concern is probably not your blog. You’ve got clients to please, products to produce, services to refine, and a whole lot more. And yet, blogging is vital to the growth of your business and the support of your customers.
Your to-do list may seem endless, but you cannot afford to ignore your blog.
If you’re disenchanted with writing for your business blog, it’s important to refocus, shake things up, and find your mojo again.
The truth of the matter is that some of us started blogging because someone told us we had to, and others started because they wanted to talk about their products and services. But those are not the right reasons to blog.
Watch our most recent video clip and learn about the top three blogging mistakes we encourage you not to make! Businesses who make these three mistakes are simply adding to the mountains of irrelevant content online and disappointing their customers by not offering the solutions they so desperately want.
If your business publishes blog posts on a regular basis, then you probably have a well-oiled routine. You put your last period on the end of another great post, hit publish, and reap the benefit of short-lived excitement before it is lost in an archive along with dozens of other posts and is forgotten. Kind of sad, but it’s true, right?
The world of blogging is no longer just for documenting study abroad trips and personal weight loss journeys. The blogosphere has exploded across the business world with strategic ways to stay relevant to your customers and provide them with the information they want at the touch of a key.
Blogging increases repeat traffic, keeps your business relevant, and improves customer positivity, according to Neil Patel’s article Why Every Business Should Blog. These are just a few reasons why maintaining a blog for your business is a 21st-century necessity.
Let’s take a deeper look at a six unique ways you can make your business blog more successful.
When it comes to writing blog posts, we want our customers to be excited about our content and be responsive to what they read. We want to create a blog our customers can connect with, but what should we include in our blogs to make it interesting for our customers? What aspects of our blog will set us apart from the rest?
Today we will discuss a few ideas that can make your blog posts more interesting and more fun for your customers to read.
Hello!
How are you doing on this fine Friday afternoon? I hope it finds you doing well and enjoying the beautiful weather we are having here in Michigan. What are you up to this weekend? I have family coming into town and we are going to spend as much of it outside as possible! Whatever you are up to, I hope you get the perfect balance of relaxation and adventure.
To switch gears completely... I must apologize for something. The mistake I have made is something I advise my clients against and that I always thought I understood.
Consistency is key. This topic has been coming up repeatedly the last few weeks. When companies are struggling to create a strong brand or to effectively engage their customers, a lack of consistency is usually the root of the problem. Being consistent is important in two core areas of your business.
First, it is imperative that you are consistent with what you are saying about your company. While it is important to share different information about your organization, your customer needs to be able to quickly identify that the content is coming from you. Whether you are posting on a blog, publishing a newsletter, or simply posting on Facebook, can your reader easily identify what your values are as a company? Is your identity clear? Do you use one tone for all of your content?
As promised, here is the blog side of the blog vs email newsletter debate. While both mediums have unique and important purposes, sometimes it is just too much for people to start with both projects at the same time. Blogging has a large variety of ways it can be used to benefit your company – from boosting the likelihood of your website being found by the general public, using it to grow your email list, and also positioning your company as an industry expert. The amount and the kind of information you can share on your blog is limitless and the people who view it have usually chosen to read your content (unlike newsletters that just arrive in their inbox). (If you want to read about the benefits and challenges of newsletters, check out our previous post!)
When faced with making the decision of starting an email newsletter or blog, a person experiences something much like coming to a fork in the road. Ultimately, you need to know what your ideal destination is. In marketing speak, you need to know what your top priorities are and what your goals are. Blogs and newsletters work well for creating engaging content and for communicating with your current and potential clients. They are very different mediums and do serve unique purposes. For today, let's focus on email newsletters... tune in next week for our take on blogs!
Email Newsletters 101:
