Everywhere you turn it seems like everyone is talking about how important blogging is for small business (and big business) websites. That is true; blogging is good for SEO since adding new posts keeps the website fresh, and more content means that you can get more long tail traffic; blogging is also good for establishing and maintaining good relationship with your customers, and for building your brand. The reasons pro are all good. The cons – there aren’t any. Unless you’re doing it wrong.
The only thing worse than not having a blog on your business website is to attempt to blog without really understanding how it should be done. And that’s the mistake many small businesses make. Are you among them? Before you start defending yourself saying “hey, I’m doing everything by the book, I’m doing my research, I’m interlinking my posts…†– we aren’t talking here about the technical aspect of blogging, and the mistakes listed below are so common that you may not even realize that they shouldn’t be done, since many others are doing them.
Are you talking about yourself a lot?
This is by far the most common one. Without even realizing it, many businesses are creating blog posts that are about them – and not about their customers. Of course, the customers probably do want to know a bit more about the people behind the brand, but that doesn’t involve the topics such as their pets, the fight with the kindergarten teacher, the plumbing issues – would you be telling them about that face to face? No? Then don’t write about these things on your business blog either.
Are you paying too much or too little attention to your post titles?
Crafting a good post title is what often makes a difference between whether people will read your post or not. A good title lets them know what the post is about, and invites them to click on it and read the rest at the same time. If you aren’t paying attention to your titles, you may as well be creating the most engaging content in the post itself – there’s a very good chance that no one will know about it.
On the other hand, if you have mastered the art of crafting the catchy titles that provide a great click through rate, but you aren’t delivering in the content, your visitors will probably feel tricked – and then you can forget about having them leave their email address, or calling for a free consultation. You haven’t delivered the first chance you had, why should they bother with you further.
Are you too much or too little of a perfectionist about your content?
You should be neither. You should be aware of the fact that your content will be seen and read by the people who are very important to your business – your potential customers, so do your best to make it worth them while. But don’t go overboard and polish it over and over again, so that it takes you two weeks to finish one article. Keep in mind that it will probably never be perfect – but it needs to be good enough.
Are you not showing that you value the content you’ve created?
If you don’t care about your content enough to promote it yourself, then why would your readers care to do it? If you don’t think that comments on your posts are worth reading and responding to, then your readers will feel the same. You have to be the first one to show that your latest post is really useful/entertaining/engaging – you are the one person who shouldn’t forget about that piece.
This post was written ba Andrew Handley, from http://www.midislandcollision.com/. If you recognize yourself in one or more of these points, then it’s time to stop and re-think your blogging strategy. Then go back and re-do all the posts on your blog – some of them will probably scream: Delete!