HOW TO ENSURE YOUR BLOG MAKES A DIFFERENCE

The next step should, ideally, be to decide the purpose of your blog. There are three main ones, which we’ll discuss below.

Even before that, you need to appreciate not what a blog is, but what it is not.

A blog is not a direct sales tool

There are plenty of opportunities on your website to talk in detail about your products and services, the benefits they deliver to customers and the expertise that goes into their creation.

To put it simply, however excited you are about your business proposition, you don’t need to make the same point again in your blog.

Well, not directly.

In writing a blog for any of the three reasons below, you should be subtly reinforcing your excellence. But by showing, not telling. The ultimate impression the reader should be left with is that you are an interesting and pleasant business to do with and that you have a command of your subject.

The only even remotely directly selling element on your blog should be a call to action as you sign off. This should effectively say: If you have enjoyed this blog and want to know more about us, get in touch.

So if a blog is not a direct sales tool, what is it? The purpose of your blog will depend on your business and where you are on your journey, but it should fulfil one of the following three objectives:

To put a human face on your business

Whether you are an SME or a multi-national corporate monolith, it will help your business if you show you have a human face too.

Cliches often become clichés because they are so true, which is definitely so in the case of the old chestnut that people buy from people. We like to buy from people we like, people who have gone the extra mile to forge an emotional connection.

So even if your blog is simply used for telling a few stories from your recent days or weeks at work, or for introducing some of the personalities who make up your team, it is fulfilling that purpose of encouraging people to know you a bit better.

To boost your Google ranking

Writing a regular blog is a great way of moving your business’s website up the ladder towards the promised land of the front page of Google and the sunlit uplands of the top three.

Google boosts websites that regularly include new copy, it has become better than ever at spotting quality copy and, of course, it rewards copy that flicks all the optimisation switches.

To establish yourself as an expert

Whether you are talking about an issue affecting your industry, offering advice about a common business problem or talking about the people in your team, the effect should be to demonstrate one thing; that you know what you are talking about.

Your audience will value this. They will feel they are in safe hands if they can be reassured that they are dealing with a person or business who are in control of their subject.

The effect is to boost your credibility and trustworthiness and that, in turn, should lead to extra engagement and investment from your potential customer base. 

What about tone and content?

Once you have decided on the purpose – or mixture of purposes – that will be served by your blog, matters like tone, content and structure will largely define themselves.

If you want to use your blog as a way of telling some funny stories that demonstrate you are people with foibles just like your audience, for instance, the tone will be chatty and informal.

Even on more serious posts, the note you should strike is a mixture of engaging and authoritative.

And, naturally, I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t suggest you make sure the grammar and spelling of your blog are absolutely impeccable. 

There are, however, three questions that need to be answered:

1/ How long should it be?

This question sparks long debate when it comes to blogging, but the answer really does depend on the purpose you are trying to fulfil.

If you are blogging purely or mostly for SEO reasons, then let it roll. Your blog should be between 2,000 and 3,000 words and an absolute minimum of 1,000.

But – and this is absolutely critical – make it readable. All too often I read blogs by people who have one or two very good points to make but stretch and pad the content artificially to make the word count more substantial.

Yes, you may hit the 2,000 mark – but your audience won’t. And ultimately, given Google’s burgeoning appetite for quality copy, it will count against you if a reader’s attention flags and they turn their eyes elsewhere.

If SEO is not the principal driver of your blog, a piece of 300-500 words that tells a story, makes a single point or discusses one small area of your industry will be effective in keeping people’s attention all the way to your concluding call to action.

2/ How often should I post?

The simple answer is that it depends on how much you have to say. It also depends on the SEO question from the section above; trying to produce insightful, entertaining and genuinely useful 2,500-word blogs every three days, for instance, would challenge even the most loquacious wordsmith.

Work out a content calendar that includes some rough subject headings and judge your schedule accordingly. Whether you post once a week or once a month, what matters is that you keep it regular.

Nothing sticks out more blatantly than visiting a blog page and finding the most recent three entries are from January, February and March… 2015. It’s the clearest evidence that a marketing director had a New Year’s resolution and broke it halfway through Spring.

3/ How should I structure it?

If you want to keep your audience engaged, do not confront them with a slab of text. Never mind 2,000 words, people’s eyes will glaze over even with an unbroken block of 300.

So break it up. Ask questions, use lists, bullet points and even visual aids such as tables of statistics to keep your visitor reading and thinking.

And don’t be afraid to ask questions, invite responses and create a conversation. You never know where it might lead.

The final piece of advice is, of course, to conclude with a call to action.

So… if you have enjoyed this blog and want to know more about how to improve your online creative presence, please get in touch.