Should My Company Have a Blog?

Blogs are not for every company. Ask yourself the following questions to help decide if your business can benefit from a blog:

•Would my primary purpose for a blog be to: a) attract new customers; b) get existing customers to spend more with me; or c) prevent current customers from leaving for competitors?

•Do I want my current customers coming to my website more often?

•If I provide educational content or tips, will my customers spend more with me?

•Are customers more likely to start/stay with me or buy more from me if I demonstrate expertise/authority in my area?

•Will providing added-value beyond my product decrease the chance my customers go to my competitors or increase the chance new customers choose me over my competitors?

•If my customers Share/Pin/Tweet/Like my content, will it generate new customers for me?

Once you know whether or not a blog can help you attract new customers, increase spending among current customers, and/or prevent current customers from defecting to competitors, you can begin developing your blog strategy.

Legal Issues

You will need to consider whether or not your legal department needs to review each post before it goes live. That might delay your posts or require you to create your content well in advance. This might also raise your cost to operate a blog.

Integrating Your Blog Into Your Overall Marketing

Your blog will work best if you can push the content out via other social media channels. Do you have a Facebook page, Twitter account, email blast program or LinkedIn page?

What About the Logistics?

Ask your IT person how he sees you operating your blog. Does he recommend setting up an internal content management system so that you can log in and make/update posts, or would he attach a blogging program like WordPress to your site? Either way, the process should be easy for you to login, type and post your content.