Blogging regularly is one of the hardest aspects of Inbound Marketing. It takes a lot of planning and organisation, but even then it can drop down in the list of priorities. Unfortunately, you really can't afford to let this happen. The data doesn't lie - if you let your blogging lapse, so too will your visits, leads and even sales.
With content at the core of what we do here at BeInbound, we know better than anyone how important B2B blogging is. To prevent downtime, we have a content production system managed by our editor whereby each of us is assigned deadlines weeks in advance. Sharing the load is ideal, not just for time management purposes but it's also great to have a mix of voices and writing styles. It also helps that we have content planning workshops every six months so we're not scrambling for blog topics every week. This can be a huge source of stress and will likely turn you off blogging for good.
Someone else who blogs regularly and is very successful in the Inbound Marketing world is Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing. In one of his recent posts on the Online Marketing Blog, he offers his expert advice on improving blog performance. Here's a sneak peek:
Make Sure Relevant Content Rules the Kingdom
Once blog goals and purpose are established or revised and you’ve refined who your target audience is, it’s time to evaluate blog content.
In a general sense, the trend in content is more visual, from images to video. Podcasts are also making an impact for certain types of blog audiences. It’s up to your assessment of blog engagement and observing industry trends to determine what media and topical mix makes sense. Just don’t make the mistake of being singularly focused in your approach.
We advocate a matrix approach with topics/keywords, audience segments, business objectives and content types all contributing to making sure content is royal.
A few tips on creating blog content:
- Follow an overall theme aligned to your target audiences and business goals
- Publish regular features on a consistent basis (Tactics Tuesdays, Friday News Roundups, Thought Leadership Mondays, Guest Posts Thursdays)
- Create an editorial calendar with some slots open for wildcards 1-2 quarters in advance.
- Ask for help in content creation (employees, customers, influencers, external writers)
- Optimize for discovery (search, social, subscription), engagement (topics, format), action (share, subscribe, inquire, refer)
- Leverage monitoring tools like BuzzSumo and SEMRush to see what content is performing well for your own blog as well as competitors – topics, titles, social shares, etc.
Make sure you head to the Online Marketing Blog to read the full article, Not Happy With Your Business Blog Performance? Try These 5 Tips, here.
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