As we saw in my recent tutorial, “What
Is Content Marketing?”, content marketing can be a great way to attract
more potential customers for your business. And a key element of content
marketing is having a popular company blog.
So in this tutorial, I’ll show you exactly
how to create a blog that will raise your profile, enhance your credibility,
and attract new customers to help your business grow.
We’ll start by covering the nuts and bolts
of starting up a blog: which platform to use, how to set the blog up, and how
to make it look professional.
Then I’ll show you some examples of company
blogs that work well, so that you can learn from them as you create your own
blog. After that, I’ll walk you through how to choose an angle for your blog
and come up with a content strategy.
By the end of the tutorial, you’ll be ready
to create a business blog that educates and entertains your readers, brings
waves of traffic to your site, and helps you reach more customers.
1. How to Start a Blog
When it comes to setting up a blog, you
have lots of options.
On Your Site vs. External
One option is to blog exclusively on a third-party
platform, such as Medium.com, LinkedIn, or even your Facebook page.
The advantages of doing it this way are
that it’s easy and usually free to set up, and that those sites already have
lots of visitors, so you may be able to get some of that traffic if your
articles catch people’s attention.
But the downsides are that you’re subject
to the limitations of those sites (where the rules can change at any time), and
also it’s harder to convert those readers into customers, which is, after all,
the ultimate goal of this exercise. You have to rely on them clicking through
to your website to find out more about you.
If you set up the blog on your own website,
on the other hand, everything’s under your control. You can set it up as you
like, and any traffic you receive is boosting the profile of your site, not
someone else’s. Also, you can more easily convert your visitors into customers,
since they are already on your site.
So I’d recommend setting up the blog on
your own site, and using social media for promotion (more on that below).
Which Platform?
WordPress is the most popular blogging
platform, powering one in four websites, but it’s not the only option. There
are others, such as Blogger, Tumblr, Ghost, and more. Some of them
provide hosting as part of the package, while others provide only the software,
and you have to host the blog yourself.
If you already have a website set up, you
may already be using one of these platforms, in which case it makes sense to
use the same one for blogging. If you had someone else set up your website,
check with them to see how it was set up and how you can include a blog within
your website.
Make It Look Professional
This blog is representing your business to
potential new customers, so you want it to look just as professional as your
business cards, brochures or signage.
While most platforms have quite serviceable
free themes (e.g. in the WordPress
Theme Directory), you can often get more features and better designs by
choosing a premium theme. You can find premium themes for WordPress, Ghost, Tumblr, and other blogging platforms on
Envato Market.
2. Read Company Blogs That Work
Before you dash ahead and write your first
post, it’s worth taking the time to think about what you’re doing, why you’re
doing it, and how you can do it better.
A good first step is to read other company
blogs. By all means check out other firms in your own industry, but also look
farther afield to get more general ideas. Here are a few interesting ones:
Marriott on the
Move
Hotel chain Marriott offers something
different from most corporate blogs: a very personal, diary-style blog written
by its 84-year-old chairman Bill Marriott himself. He penned a popular Mother’s
Day post last year, for example, Remembering
My Mom on Mother’s Day.
What
You Can Learn: Company blogs are often impersonal, but readers respond well to personal stories, told in a friendly
voice.
Google Official
Blog
A general rule with company blogs is not to
write too much about your own products. But this is a rule the Google blog
breaks, with lots of new announcements about, for example, a new photo album
feature for Google Photos, or a virtual reality painting app. But it makes them
enticing, and includes other types of post too.
What
You Can Learn: New product announcements can be
popular, if the products are interesting enough, and if the announcements are
broken up with more personal, behind-the-scenes stories. Also, a minimalist
aesthetic works just fine.
CE-BLOG
A chemical company is not a great candidate
for interesting blogging, but Celanese has its employees write interesting
posts about subjects with broad appeal, from homelessness to workplace
diversity.
What
You Can Learn: Even if you don’t think you’re in an
inherently “cool” or interesting industry, you can create a blog that people
want to read.
Zillow Porchlight
Real-estate information company Zillow
provides some useful “how-to” material on its blog, but also throws in posts
about the houses being sold by celebrities like Uma Thurman, Wes Craven, and
Britney Spears. Those are some very click-friendly headlines.
What
You Can Learn: If you can find an angle for your
business that touches on very popular subjects like celebrities, TV or sports,
don’t be afraid to mine it.
The Home Depot Blog
People go to Home Depot to buy products for
home renovation projects, so a natural subject for the blog is to give people
useful information on how to complete those projects.
What
You Can Learn: This is a good example of a
classic content marketing approach: teaching people to use the products you
sell.
3. Choose Your Angle
As you can see from these examples, each
blog has a particular angle. It might mix different types of content, but it
has a general approach and sticks to it.
So as you’re planning out your blog, think
about the approach you plan to take. Will you be teaching people how to use the
products you sell? Telling personal stories about your experiences as a
business owner? Inviting your employees or even customers to tell their own
stories? Covering news or trends in your industry?
Also think about a name for your blog. Some
companies just go for “The [Company Name] Blog”, which is fine, but a separate
name like Zillow Porchlight or Marriott on the Move gives it a stronger identity.
What are your goals for this blog? Are you
trying to increase traffic to your website, get people signed up to your
mailing list, get people to become customers, or simply increase your overall
profile and credibility?
Who is the target audience? This is likely
to be similar to your existing target market for your business as a whole, but
it could be different—if, for example, you’re trying to expand your customer
base by attracting younger customers, or wealthier customers, or more women in a traditionally male-dominated market, etc. All of these things affect the type
of content you’ll create.
As you’re coming up with your angle,
remember the following key points:
Define your target audience clearly,
picturing your ideal customer as a single person with his or her own
personality, hopes, dreams and frustrations, and write as if you’re talking
directly to that person.
Provide information that your target
customer will find useful and/or entertaining.
Don’t be too salesy or
self-promotional—nobody’s going to like, share or comment on something that
sounds like a press release.
Your niche needs to be small enough that
the blog has a clear focus, but large enough to allow you to come up with new
posts on a regular basis for the next few years.
Stories work well in blogs, but only if
they’re interesting and have some relevance to a wider audience (and if they
don’t sound like effusive customer testimonials for your company).
Consider different types of content beyond
written posts—videos, audio podcasts, images and infographics are all good
strategies, either for the whole blog or as extra content to mix in with the
text.
4. Create a Content Strategy
Now that you’ve set up your blog, got a
sense of what works, and decided on your own angle, it’s time to create a
content strategy for your blog.
What does that mean? Think of it as a
vision and plan for your blog. It starts with the picture of your ideal
customer that you defined in the last step. Give that person a name and a face,
and describe him or her in as much detail as you can. Think about what that
person wants to know about, what problems he or she wants to overcome, and how
you can be of service.
Then create a list of keywords that this
person might search for online, and use these keywords to inform the posts you
write. The aim is not to cram keywords into posts purely for SEO purposes, but
to write content on subjects that your target customer will search for, discover, enjoy, and share.
The plan you create for your blog should
fit in with your overall marketing strategy. For more, see the following posts:
Marketing
How to Write a Lean Marketing Plan
Celine Roque
Content Marketing
What Is Content Marketing?
Andrew Blackman
Branding
How to Define Your Core Brand Values (And Why You Should)
Julia Melymbrose
Blogging
Creating a Successful Authority Blog: A Complete Guide to Branding
Tom Ewer
Blogging
Build an Authority Blog That Will Engage With Your Target Audience
Tom Ewer
Now think about the frequency of the posts.
Of course it’s good to write frequently, but blogging can be time-consuming,
and it’s better to write a great post once a month than to throw filler content
up there every day. Be realistic, and create a schedule that you can stick to.
Of course, you don’t have to write all the
posts yourself. You could assign a staff member to be responsible for the blog,
or have several employees contribute their own posts. You might even invite
contributions from outside the company. If you plan to collate posts from
multiple authors, see the following tutorial for the process to follow:
Blogging
A Proven, Step-by-Step Process for Managing Multi-Author Blogs
Alexis Grant
Another option is to outsource the content
creation to a freelancer, but be careful who you choose. Remember that your
reputation is on the line here, and you need to hire someone you trust. A good
place to find reliable, experienced freelancers is in the Content & Writing
section on Envato Studio.
Once you’ve got the topics and the authors
sorted out, it’s time to create an editorial calendar. If you’re using
WordPress, the free Editorial
Calendar plugin is useful. Otherwise, a simple spreadsheet or whatever app
you’re comfortable with is fine.
Try to plan out content several months in advance. That sounds like a lot, but it pays to get ahead—the last thing
you want to do when blogging is to go for a while without posting and be
casting around desperately for ideas. The long-range plan can have plenty of
room for adjustments to account for current events—it’s good for a blog to be
up-to-date, but it’s also good to have some evergreen content planned out. Also look out for seasonal events or commemorative days that could give you a good angle for a post.
Think of some regular features that will help to give your content structure. For example, if you blog
once a week, maybe one of the four monthly slots could be an interview with an
industry leader, the second could be a topical, news-driven post, the third
could be a video giving an inside look at some aspect of your firm, and the
fourth could be an advice or “how-to” article.
That’s just an example, of course—your own
content strategy could be very different. The point is to plan out your content well in advance, so that you have a clear direction and the material is well thought
out, based on the personality and interests of your ideal customer.
Next Steps
So that’s how to start a business blog.
You’ve seen how to get set up, how to do some research and choose an angle that
will interest people, and how to create a content strategy and editorial
calendar.
The next step, of course, is to start
creating that content. Stick to your plan, and try to schedule posts in advance
so that you don’t have any gaps. Remember also to leave time for engaging with
readers and responding to any comments you receive. One of the benefits of a
company blog is in making your business seem approachable, and you lose that
benefit if you ignore comments that come your way.
It’s also important to promote the posts as
much as you can on social media, as part of your overall content marketing plan.
Having engaging imagery or videos and a good headline will help a lot with this.
It’s also good if you can learn to pick out elements of the post that will
attract attention or spark conversations on social media. Try asking a
question.
For more tips on starting a company blog,
check out some of the other tutorials in our blogging category
on Envato Tuts+, such as:
Headlines
The Sexy Art of Writing Headlines that Kill
Leo Babauta
Marketing
5 Easy Tips for Getting 100,000 Visitors to Your Blog Posts
Carol Tice
Blogging
How Even Mediocre Writers Can Create a Marketable Freelance Business Blog
Tara Hornor
Blogging
How to Create Unique Content for Your Authority Blog
Tom Ewer