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Newsletter #705: The “Making Corporate Blogging Easier” Issue

{Welcome back to the Damn, I Wish I Thought of That Email Newsletter. This is text of the great issue all of our email subscribers just received. Sign yourself up using the handy form on the left.} 

 

Corporate blogging isn’t so hard. Here’s how to start: 

1> Pick a topic
2> Call to all employees
3> Try a group blog
4> Test it out in real time 

 

1> Pick a topic 

Write about something that no one else is writing about. Life insurance broker AccuQuote has a blog answering questions about life insurance (http://accuquoteblog.com). Their blog is successful because people who search for questions about life insurance find this blog, and other bloggers link to it because no one else is writing about it. If AccuQuote had a blog about just AccuQuote — or what their CEO had for lunch every day — nobody would care. 

The Lesson: Pick a unique slant on the industry, and blog exclusively about that. 

 

2> Call to all employees 

Your CEO or Director of Marketing doesn’t have to blog. Send out an open call to all employees simply asking who wants to be a blogger. The people who should write the blog should be the people who really want to. Let those who respond write practice posts for a week, and if they’re any good, throw them online. 

The Lesson: The people who want to blog will make the best corporate bloggers. 

 

3> Try a group blog 

Create a variety of content by getting a bunch of your employees writing on your blog. If you have only one blogger and she leaves the company, your blog is in trouble. Whole Foods’ blog was the CEO’s personal blog. When the CEO got in hot water, the company lost the only voice it had to respond to criticism. A great example of a group blog is Google’s official blog (http://googleblog.blogspot.com/), which features posts from employees at all levels. 

The Lesson: The more voices on your blog, the better. 

 

4> Test it out in real time 

Start writing regularly until your blog finds a voice, topic, and an audience. When other blogs start linking back to you, you’ve hit the right one. Write about all sorts of stuff. When people start responding to certain topics, write more about that. 

The Lesson: No amount of planning will tell you what works. Just type.

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