Content is King! How many times have you seen these three words over the last year or two? Am I wrong when I say you have seen it multiple times? There are innumerable blogs talking about the online marketing strategy of blogging/content creation and why all businesses should be doing it. So, why then are there still businesses on the web not taking advantage of The King?
Some of the reasons are good ones. If you are running a one- or two-person operation and you are busy from when you clock in until you leave, you might not have the time to blog. Another reason might be that you don’t consider yourself a good writer. Whatever your reason, creating valuable content is a good way to show that you are an expert in your profession.
What you do need is an online marketing content creation strategy, and here are six issues to cover.
1. Ask the question: Will this blog help me to reach my goals?
If blogging does not contribute to achieving your businesses goals then you should seriously reconsider why you do it. You can even use the SWOT analysis framework here.
- Strengths – Will blogging be regarded as a strength and help us to reach our goals? When we create content we build a body of knowledge and are consistently exploring new concepts and ideas. Not only do we become experts, we are also enriching visitor’s experiences to our blog and increase the possibility of them returning.
- Weakness – Is it a weakness if we do not blog? If creating content was easy we would all be doing it. However, blogging is challenging, to say the least. When we blog we stretch our mind, we create new concepts, views, processes or systems. We have to think how we explain something so other will understand it. So, what do you think, is not blogging a weakness?
- Opportunity – Will blogging help us to capitalize on opportunities in the market? Prospects are consistently looking for information regarding products and services. The latest indication is over 46 percent of daily Google searches are for products and services. As mentioned above, when prospects find the information they search for on our blogs, they will return, giving us an opportunity to build a relationship with them.
- Threat – Prospects are searching daily for information regarding your products and/or services. However, all they find are the content created by your competitors. They become familiar with your competitors’ content and soon sign up to receive their blogs. What do you think, is not blogging a threat to your business? As they say, this is a no brainer….
Who do you want to be interested in your information? In other words, who is your target market? Ironically, you already know them. They come into your establishment; you talk to them and know many things about them. Now, when you write your blog, write as if you are talking to them. Focus on them and be sure that when they comment, you get back with them online as soon as you can.
3. How do you want to sound?
Do you want to be formal or informal? Are you having a dialogue, interacting with readers or are you the teacher having a monologue. As a corner stone of Inbound Marketing, content creation enables you to earn the attention of prospects thru the content you make available. Thus, how you make this content available will have a significant influence on how prospects decide to interact with you. Another question to consider: Will you be using different writers from inside your business, each with her own way of writing?
4. Your blogging schedule.
It is as important to your blog as it is to your business. You need to set up a blogging calendar with your schedule on it. You already have a calendar for business related issues. And, now that you have your blogging schedule on your calendar it frees up your mind to think of all those issues you want to blog about. Remember the questions that clients keep asking, or the new concept that you stumbled on! So when “Blog Day” comes along you have more than enough relevant topics to blog about.
5. Spreading the word.
The next step is to start distributing your blog posts to other places on the web. Your website is a good starting point, but you can also use social media tactics such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Google +, StumbleUpon, Digg, Reddit, etc. to send your posts to more people. The more people who see your blog the more prospects you’ll add to your mailing list.
6. Analyze, measure and adjust
Your blogs are going out on a regular basis and readers are subscribing to your RSS feed. Now it’s time to analyze your results, to measure it against the goals you’ve set when you started and adjust if necessary. Using tools such as Google Analytics you can determine where your visitors are coming from, what keywords they searched for, how long they stay on your site, and, do they visit more than one page. Knowing all these help you to make informed decisions about the type and quality of content that you make available.
To develop and implement a successful business blogging strategy is not that difficult if you know what you want to achieve. Take your time to plan what you want to accomplish and how you are going to achieve it. Remember, failing to plan is the recipe for planning to fail.
Let us know how you implemented your successful content creation strategy. What were your biggest issues to overcome?
Jaco Grobbelaar is the owner of BroadVision Marketing. BroadVision Marketing works with business owners to put in place inbound and outbound marketing strategies that consistently secure new clients. The BroadVision Marketing Training Center is located in Petaluma, CA and primarily serves companies in the San Francisco Bay area.
Jaco can be reached at jaco@broadvisionmarketing.com or 707.766.9778 or connect with Jaco on Facebook - www.facebook.com/broadvisionmarketing - and LinkedIn - www.linkedin.com/in/JacoGrobbelaar.