Mastering your Businesses BLOG, How many times have you thought of writing a BLOG for your business? I’m sure the first thought is that it would be a great resource, a valuable opportunity to promote your products or services. Then reality sits in. “What am I going to write about?” you ask yourself. “How much time can I dedicate to getting this job done?” “What about my social networks?” How can you keep your business running and find time to add another “to do” to your list?
Here are some BLOG basics that should help. First, decide the purpose of your BLOG. Why are you writing one? What issues do you hope to address with your commentary? Will you be helping your clients with a problem? Sharing your unique voice or particular expertise? Announcing new products or services?
Once you answer these questions, start organizing your BLOG posts into titles.
Second, research what similar posts you find that are already available on the Internet. Will your BLOG add value to a similar topic? Do you have a different point of view you think can help your customers or readers? Once you determine those answers, you are ready to locate resources on other websites that may underscore your message. Sharing information from other websites in your blog can be a good way to showcase your expertise, however you want to be sure that doing so will not take readers away from your content.
The best way to provide readers linked content while ensuring your site remains readily available is to set up additional link using the “open link in new window” feature. This will open links you set in a second window, leaving your website open for readers to easily come back to. This way, your readers can follow the link without officially leaving your site.
Another way to do this is to reference the link location using its URL instead of actually hot linking to it. I prefer the link because it will create strong SEO “ Search Engine Optimization” and help increase your web site ranking.
Third, proper SEO set-up and consistency on your BLOG is a must. Schedule a specific time of day and day of the week you will post your BLOG each week. You may want to experiment with this to see which days/times of the week provide you the best readership.
Finally, broadcast your BLOG post on all of your social networks. With the push of a button, your BLOG can syndicate to all of your business and personal social networks at the same time. Remember that all social network require a different image size and text configuration. It is important to research the network and determine how your BLOG post can best use the particular social platform. For example, you may want to include just a photo from your blog on Instagram, or a video on YouTube, a link to the BLOG on Twitter and so forth. Work with your audience to ask them what information they want to hear about to help streamline your offerings. Find business partners to help get the word out, and partner with other businesses can can add value to your BLOG. All of this can be done with some planning and simple effort.
Happy BLOGGING! If you would like to see something addressed in a future edition of Tech Tips, please send me a note and I will do my best to add it to the schedule.