A corporate website stands out in most cases as being just a brochure with some details. That is not at all great. Many business managers realized the importance of having a blog but that does not mean that you can simply blog as you would on a personal site.
Company blogs can help out the entire company in getting new customers interested in the service or product that is promoted. This is something that you surely want.
The problem is that there are many mistakes that you can make with your company blog. Many do not even realize that they make mistakes. Take a look at those mentioned below and avoid them at all costs.
1. Blogging Without A Strategy
This is, most likely, the biggest mistake that you can do with your company blog. It is better to not start blogging at all if you do not have a good strategy in place as it would only end up hurting you. You can properly blog for web if you know what you are doing on the company blog, even with only a few visitors. Company sites do not actually have a lot of traffic especially in the beginning. However, even small traffic can convert into business.
Think about the following when creating your company blogging strategy:
- Do you actually need a blog? – In some cases you do not actually need to have a company blog because your company will never be social.
- What is your business objective? – The goals that you have need to drive your blogging. As an example, in the event that you want to connect with other companies, the campaign that you build needs to be different than when you want to generate an increase in sales. You cannot simply post really good content and expect to reach your goal.
- Do you have the needed resources? – Whenever you set up a company blog, you need to dedicate resources and time to it. You cannot post once per month and expect success.
2. Not Linking
If you build any type of blog, you need to be read to link. This is a huge part of any blogging strategy, especially when referring to a company that basically needs to do everything correctly. Remember the following:
- Never be afraid to link – Too many company blogs think about PageRank leakage and sway away from all links. This is a mistake. You want to always highlight the fact that you are properly connected with your industry and this is possible through links. Just think about a minimum link number for each post and respect that rule.
- Always cite sources – This is something that is ethical and can help you out a lot in building relationships with similar websites. Remember that one of the most important things in blogging is reciprocity. When you link to other blogs, there is a strong choice that other blogs will also link to yours.
- Link To Your Resources – You need to connect your content. Internal links are necessary for proper search engine optimization and if you have more websites, you should seriously consider linking between them.
3. Talking Only About Your Company
A company blog is not meant to simply talk about your business. This is a huge mistake that is a lot more common than it should be. The blog should not just focus on you. It needs to build authority in your industry. Remember the following:
- Blogs Are Not Meant For Your Press Releases – You can have a section on the site that talks about company news. However, this should not be the main focus of what you blog about. The blogs are meant to showcase the fact that businesses are human. If the visitor only sees promotional posts, the strength of the brand is actually diminished.
- Think About What The Audience Needs – A business usually wants to talk about itself. That is normal and understandable. However, your visitors want to find something of real value on the company blog. There are too many out there that are simply filled with jargon terms, product details and stats. Your visitors are not professionals. The blog has to use a language that everyone understands and answer questions that visitors might have.
4. Acting Like Someone Else
The company blog needs to highlight the fact that there is a real person behind it and that person has to be showcased. This means that you cannot actually have an intern blog and then choose another intern to continue blogging. It is a huge mistake and the intern will not be able to act as a CEO.
You need to show that you are a human. Always sign the posts with the real name of the person that writes it and showcase the position that he/she has in your company. You can even have different people in your company blog. However, while using personal tones is a good idea, make sure that you do not blog too much about personal aspects. Personal stories should be kept on personal blogs or on social networks.
Only blog about topics that you know a lot about! This is something that is highly important for every single company blog out there. You cannot write incomplete articles or try to act as if you know more than you actually do.
5. Not Connecting The Blog To Social Media
Ignoring social media is basically the biggest mistake that you could do with your company blog. Whenever writing a new post, make sure that you talk about it on Facebook and Twitter. Think about other social networks that are also suitable based on your business and ( when people comment, answer! This is the best way to establish yourself as a high authority figure and a real person.
Using social media has one huge advantage: it helps in building relationships with other specialists in the industry and with your clients. When you engage, you gain many advantages.
Make sure that your company blog is suitable according to what you want to do with it. This may very well be the best thing that you ever did for your online presence.
