Business Blogging Favored by Marketers
An Eye-opener on Attitudes to Business Blogging
Here’s a paradox.
When I speak to business owners about incorporating a blog or blogs in their social media strategy the response is, at best, polite but unengaged listening.
That contrasts with the often quite animated discussions I get into about Facebook, Twitter and even LinkedIn (rarely YouTube, Google+ or Pinterest, Instagram etc).
But according to Michael Stelzner’s recently released Social Media Marketing Industry Report 2014, blogging holds the top spot for future social media marketing plans.
More so for B2B companies but also for B2C.
According to the report, 68% of marketers plan on increasing their use of blogging, as compared with 67% for YouTube and Twitter, and 64% for LinkedIn and Facebook, in that order.
What that says to me is, in part, that many of the business owners I talk to are missing out on a potentially valuable element of a social media strategy.
The coach/educator in me immediately wants to be able to do something about that.
To tell the story more powerfully, so that they might look again and at least consider the possibilities.
I’m ready to evangelize, if you will. After all, in years gone by I described what I did as being a blogging evangelist. 🙂
Developing the value proposition
I know that there is limited potential for evangelism in just quoting those percentages above to business owners. For a start, many business owners would not really know what a blog is, or else – especially if they have some idea but basically think of blogs as a very personal thing (the legitimate but limited “online diary” concept) – they might not see what blogging has to do with their business.
But those figures from the report tell me that some presumably smart marketers have worked out that there is value to be gained from establishing and developing a company blog or blogs. So I will use the percentages, but by no means as a standalone or even seriously persuasive argument.
Because I know from experience that the business benefits from blogging need to be spelled out in plain language, as free as possible of any blogging jargon.
In a blog post last year on another site I listed and explained the following five business benefits for having a corporate or business blog.
- More effective inbound marketing
- Better search engine results
- Thought leadership
- Increased engagement with customers and prospects
- Social media integration
Although I wrote something in that blog post about each of those benefits, I’m thinking now that each could do with a fresh post of its own.
A series.
In saying that, I have to confess I’m wary of promising a series: I’ve done so before on one or another topic and “life got in the way” before I completed it.
But I’m excited about that finding from the Social Media Marketing Industry study and am keen to explore ways in which the value of blogging may be communicated effectively to business owners.
So that’s a kind of a promise of a series on how blogging can be valuable for a business.
If you have any questions about business blogging, or experiences – positive or negative – to share, please use the comments section below. I’d love to get some input for that tentatively promised series!
And if you would like to have on a more private basis a no-obligation chat about how a blog might benefit your particular business, please get in touch with me via the Contact page. I’ll be happy to arrange a time for a phone or Skype conversation. No strings! 🙂
Image credit: Blog, by xioubin low via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0
Des Walsh
Business coach and digital entrepreneur. With coach training from Coachville.com and its Graduate School of Coaching, and a founding member of the International Association of Coaching, Des has been coaching business owners and entrepreneurs for the past 20 years. Over the same period he has also been actively engaged in promoting the business opportunities of the digital economy. He is a certified Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) coach, and a certified specialist in social media strategy and affiliate marketing.
Great article, Des!
We need you to evangelize the benefits of business blogging 🙂
Unfortunately, many businesses think blogging is too time and labour intensive and are scared to put the effort into it. In fact, blogging doesn’t mean you have to write like a journo, it is more sharing your knowledge, opinions and passion for your products or services with your prospective clients. This should come easy to every business owner as this is the reason why they are in business in the first place 🙂
I highly recommend talking to Des about implementing blogging into your social media strategy if you haven’t done so yet!
Hi!
Des, I am totally agreed with your opinion towards the business blogging. In current marketing era, blogging takes a significant place to gain the visibility on the web. Most of the B2B and B2C marketers take the help of social mediums such as Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. I think; Instagram is the well featured network to express the brand in a right way. Thanks for the post!
Thanks so much! Especially as blogger for hire, it’s great to see folks preach the gospel of the blog.
Hi Des, I could not agree more about the value of business blogging. So many people do not appreciate how much it can do for a business, they see it as an optional extra, but for me it is essential! It’s great to see someone else who also places a high value on blogging.
I absolutely support blogging for business. Sure there are new strategies to engage audience but you cannot disregard the importance of making the voice for your business heard through a business blog. In my opinion, blogging and social media strategies should be integrated to achieve better results.