CEOs are busy people. Where would they find time to blog?
You may already know there are serious business benefits to blogging, but may not have given much thought yet as to how to get started.
If you’re interested, here’s a great example of a blogging CEO:
George Colony is CEO at Forrester the global research and advisory firm. Forrester are thought leaders in technology, IT, marketing and strategy, and George still has a bit of time to blog.
So, why does the company head of a worldwide company of thought leaders bother with blogging?
Here are some benefits to being a blogging CEO:
If you haven’t started blogging to support your business, what are you waiting for? Nearly everyone’s doing it, and there are good reasons why.
The number of blog readers in the US was reckoned to have reached 122.6 million in 2011, and that figure represented 53.5% of internet users, according to eMarketer. These stats indicate that there’s a huge market out there waiting for your blogs. (more…)
Creating high quality content will drive traffic to your website, increasing your online reach and opportunity to generate valuable leads. This task lies with your blog and content copywriting team, whether inhouse or outsourced, to continually produce compelling content to keep existing readers captivated and new ones curious. Avoid content-writers’ block by adopting the following tips to get your content machine moving.
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HubSpot’s Director of Product Marketing, Kirsten Knipp, headlined Scottish Enterprise’s latest conference –‘ Winning Through Innovation: Let New Business Find You’- on Friday 17th June in Glasgow.
The event was hugely popular with over 150 attendees and many external viewers watching the conference via live webcast. Get top marketing tips from the event on how to grow your business online by watching the video. (more…)
Have you run your website through the HubSpot Website Grader recently? If your score was a little lame, don’t stress – there is a sure fire way to get your Website and score cranking! Start a blog!
Create Remarkable Content
A blog will transform your web presence as it allows you to provide your audience with new, thought provoking and well… remarkable content! It will allow you to create more pages that will be indexed by search engines, and as you may well know every page on your website provides you with an opportunity to rank in Google! This means potentially being found by more of your prospects which is always a good thing! An added bonus of creating new posts frequently is that the Website Grader specifically assesses how many indexed pages you have, so not only will you be found more easily by your prospects, your website grade will rocket too!
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Blogging is often overlooked for other flashier social media marketing options like Facebook and Twitter. However, having a successful business blog not only supports lead generation; it also provides thoughtful engaging content needed to be successful on social media. While blogging is important, it can also be challenging. Once you have mastered the art of regularly creating content for your blog, it is time to take it to the next level.
The next level of business blogging is really about doing what may seem simple but exercises a major impact on your business blogging success.
7 Ways to Take Your Business Blog to the Next Level
1. Write Short and Clear Headlines - Headlines are a critical element of your blog posts. They tell humans and search engines what your article is about when they see it in search results, on Twitter, on Facebook, on LinkedIn, or in email. One of the best ways to work on clear headlines is to shorten them as much as possible. Try to never have a blog post headline be more than 9 words. If you can get it shorter, that is even better. The simpler your article, the more it will spread.
Blogging is no longer a personal publication medium that allows bloggers to write about anything that takes their fancy, it is a flexible and influential marketing tool. The Technorati ‘State of the Blogsphere’ survey show that there are now more than 133 million blogs out there, emphasising how important blogging is if you needed any convincing.
In today’s web savvy world, the first stage of the buying process often starts on search engines. It is therefore essential that potential clients can find you quickly and easily online. Blogging provides an excellent opportunity for your organisation to be found more easily. By optimising blogs with specifically targeted keywords, your blog can help you achieve higher search engine rankings and increased visibility will draw traffic to your web estate.
Appearing in search engines will drive traffic, but to ensure that individuals stay there and return in the future, it is essential that you create valued content. The only person who really cares about how great your product is is you. It is imperative that you become a valuable resource for your target audience by offering thought provoking, fun and educational articles and not by using your blog purely as a promotional tool.
Establishing thought leadership within your field should be an objective of any corporate blog. This helps your business differentiate itself from the competition. By resolving issues, visitors will see your blog as a valuable resource and this will allow your organisation to create a dialogue with your key personas and help building relationships within your market place.
Bringing more people to your blog is great! But in the world of business it is essential that you get your blog to do something for you. Technorati report that 53% of professional bloggers aim to attract new clients, so it is essential that your blog acts also as a lead generation tool.
All of the points laid out previously will attract visitors but in order to achieve a blog ROI, you must create relevant and valuable calls to action (CTAs) on each of your blog posts. Ensuring you are offering the correct CTAs on your blog is a science. We will explore this in greater depth on another day… so be sure to subscribe to the Brightfire blog so you can read part 2 of Business Blogs Work: Generating more leads with effective blog CTAs.
