Blogging has transcended just vanity self-publication and has become not only a primary inbound marketing vehicle to generate awareness and education on a particular subject, but a cost effective means to generate and nurture leads.
For those of you who have been living in the dark ages and still don’t know what a blog I would suggest heading over to ProBlogger for a pretty comprehensive answer then Google “how to start a blog” for your favorite free blog site to start your own.
For those of you already in the blogosphere and are looking for ways to turn your vanity posts into something more tangible for demand generation I would suggest starting with Pamela Vaughn’s recent blog at Hubspot titled “11 Clever Ways To Nurture Leads With Your Business Blog” which has this to offer:
- Implement smart calls to action
- Blog about topics sourced from your sales team
- Enable salespeople with top blog content
- Email blog content to segments of unengaged leads
- Add blog content to workflows
- Add links for blog content to other parts of your website
- Weave mentions of your products/services into blog content where appropriate
- Use top/sidebar blog real estate wisely
- Link to middle of the funnel offers within blog content when appropriate
- Encourage blog subscription
- Promote your social media presence on your blog
The most important actions I would recommend in addition is:
- Be consistent: try to publish at least one blog of 300+ words weekly and ideally 2-3 blogs per week if content is readily available and your are a prolific writer.
- Be personal: the best blogs are those from a specific individual and not just a generic company blog. Remember this is a social media and people prefer to engage in conversation with other people.
- Develop and maintain a point of view: debates, hot topics and strong fact-based perspectives will generally attract and engage enthusiastic readership.
- Cross-link to similar or adjacent content: building a social network is best done by connecting with other already established networks and offering a new perspective.
Remember to measure everything you do and don’t be discouraged if you don’t generate an immediate readership. Keep diligent and you will eventually attract the best audience for your message.
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