Tag

blogging for business

5 Ways to Be a Better Business Blogger

By Uncategorized

It’s incredible, when I think back over the last six years or so, the evolution of blogging in business. What used to be a hard sell (yes, blogging is going to be very important for your business) is now standard-issue stuff. Successful businesses blog! Successful business people are bloggers. It’s so exciting to be not only watching but involved with this evolution in a very hands-on, integrated way.

Since you’re here, you’re probably a blogger for your business. Feel free to tell us about your blog in the comments — we’d all like to visit and read your posts!

I know we all get a little stuck sometimes, or a bit uninspired, so here’s a list of five ways to give you a boost in blogging:

  1. Involve others in the process. Even if you’re a sole proprietor there are other people you work with as vendors, partners or key customers. Ask them for ideas and inspiration. Get them to use Pinterest or Delicious to collect ideas for you to blog about. (OK, true story: I clicked over to Pinterest to add the link to this post and yeah, you lost me there for about half an hour. Behold the power of Pinterest. I’m back now. If you did the same, I hope you returned to finish this post with me.)
  2. Ask your readers what they’d like to see on your blog. I often ask my followers on Twitter for blog post ideas and they come up with some great ones!
  3. Read something you don’t normally read. If you’re a regular of the business section, try health or science, lifestyle or sports . . . mix it up to find a new angle that applies to what you do.
  4. Get visual! Look for or capture an image that sums up how you’re feeling, what you’re doing or what you’re seeing. Video is fun, as well (the shorter, the better.) Can you challenge yourself to tell a video story in 60 seconds?
  5. Dig deep. Share something personal (personal never, ever means PRIVATE). It is so valuable to show the human side of your business. We all have one — let your audience connect to yours. Some of my most popular business blog posts of all time have been from a very personal perspective.

I hope this is helpful to you — and remember, I want to read your blogs, so go ahead and pitch them below.

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The Culture of Social Media without the Platforms; Mind = Blown

By Communications, Public Relations, Social Media

It’s a very busy time for my business and yesterday included a marathon of meetings right in a row (six!). Right in the middle, we met with a prospective client.

Now, Jaggers Communications offers the full suite of communications services from public relations to brand positioning to social media strategy, but often client conversations begin with learning about social media (it is a specialty of our firm). One of the people we met with shared his complete lack of use and knowledge of social media. He’s not engaged in any way online and hasn’t had an interest in doing so personally, even though he understands it’s important for his business to begin to seriously look at digital communications and how they should be used.

Then, he went on about his business philosophy, about how he prefers to serve clients, to interact with partners, to collaborate and nurture a culture of transparency within his organization.

And then my brain exploded.

Everything he said is exactly the culture that social media has established and worked to grow. It’s precisely where bloggers hoped business would evolve when it became impossible to hide behind a curtain of complacency. But it wasn’t the culture online that drove this man’s business values; it’s how his company has done business since the 1970s, long before blogs, Facebook and Twitter.

It was so refreshing, and so very exciting for me to meet with someone who “got it” before the technical aspects were even brought into the discussion. In fact, the words we use to talk about the tactics of social media are almost irrelevant. They’re tools to get us to the goals we make. The framework and quality are there; the genuine stories and rich culture exist; we have the honor of helping the business share them online.

Sometimes my work makes me giddy.

Business Blogging: Are you Overthinking it?

By Communications, Social Media

Blogging for and about your business is more important now than ever. And yet, businesses are still struggling not only with the execution, but the concept. 

Here are some of the hangups I hear from clients roadblocked by blogging fear or misunderstanding:

  • We don’t have a consumer project, so it doesn’t seem like anyone would be interested in reading what we have to share.
  • Doesn’t it have to be personal? We don’t really want to share our dirty laundry online.
  • What if we are boring?

Telling the story about your business and what you do is valuable to your community, no matter what that community is. They self-select into your content, so don’t pre-judge by saying that people who read blogs are only interested in consumer products. You may discover much more about your audience and your business by the community that emerges around the content you share.

Being personal doesn’t mean airing dirty laundry. Being personal means being a real person, using language that is down-to-earth and spin-free, sharing a bit of yourself that underscores the fact that you are a real human being behind the brand. (Someone just walked past me wearing swishy — snow?– pants and those awful Five Fingers shoes. Distracting! — See? I’m a real person with really distracting co-workers, just like you.)

 

You can’t be boring if you’re not boring yourself. If YOU find your business and what it offers exciting and you share your passion for your topics, that will be evident to your audience. Feel free to mix it up now and again — be creative — be funny — but above all, be yourself, and quit overthinking it.

 

Where do you blog? Please feel free to share your blog in the comments for the Change the Conversation audience to enjoy.

Social Media: Providing Valuable Content or Just Over-sharing?

By Communications, Social Media

It’s a really fine line sometimes, the balance between over-sharing company news and content on social platforms and making sure you’re providing value to your audience. It’s the difference, I think, between selling and telling your company story. It’s hard for a lot of individuals representing organizations to make this distinction. One way to keep this practice in check is to constantly ask yourself what value you’re providing your audience with the information you choose to share.

Your content may be leaning to the “too self-promotional” side if every link you share is to content of your own creation. Try to share others’ content at least a third of the time. Another self-check is to see how often your tweets are @ replies or RTs. Ask yourself a few questions:

  1. Are you engaging in conversation with your readers by replying to comments or tweets?
  2. Are you commenting on others’ blog posts?
  3. Are you facilitating introductions within your network to help others build business or find opportunities?
  4. Are you teaching a skill or sharing information to others’ benefit?

It’s easy to slip into the habit of traditional marketing tactics and resort to selling . . . focus on providing value, instead and watch relationship development grow and improve.

(Thanks to Rusty Speidel for the inspiration for today’s post. Read Rusty’s thoughts on social media fatigue, and what communications professionals should do about it.)

What are some ways you keep your commitment to providing value, rather than just self-promotional content, to your audience?

Small Business Blogs: How to do it right

By Social Media

I’m so delighted and proud of the way SCARPA is using their blog. Yes! SCARPA is a client!

Check this out — a recent blog post that incorporates several best practices elements, 3 Ways to Tie a Scarf:

  1. It provides value, teaching a skill clients really want to have.
  2. It uses video, thus capturing the YouTube audience as a second source of search engine optimization.
  3. It’s REAL and authentic, from a real employee demonstrating something she’s asked about in the store on a daily basis. It’s not high quality, polished and professionally produced, but that’s part of its charm. It’s Kai’li — someone SCARPA shoppers know, sharing what she knows with a wider audience.

And now you know three ways to tie a scarf!