One of the best ways for a company to reach out to their customers and build a strong brand is corporate blogging. However, there are a lot of misconceptions out there and a lot of room for error. Let’s take a look at some techniques that you can use to make sure that your corporate blogging experience goes smoothly.
1. Hire the right person for the job.
Unless you have someone on your team that is familiar with how blogging works and how to handle themselves under pressure, you may want to consider hiring a professional to manage your blog for you. This is the best solution for most companies, especially since they may not have enough resources to devote to running a blog. The person that you select to run your blog should be professional but personable and they should always display grace under fire. If you don’t have anyone that fits that description, you will definitely need to get some help with blog management.
2. Use the right tools.
There are numerous blogging platforms out there that make it so much easier to run a corporate blog. However, they are not all created equal. While many companies resort to using free blog management tools, this can give the wrong impression. It is best to host your blog on your own site for several reasons. First, you’re going to want to get as much traffic to your site as possible. Using a third part blogging application does not accomplish this. Next, you don’t want to give your readers the impression that you’re too cheap to run your own blog.
There are several blogging applications that can be installed on your own server. Most are free and can be easily customized to fit your specifications. This is a much better choice and you’ll have more control over the environment.
3. Make sure you have an RSS feed ready to go.
If you are trying to run a blog without the benefit of a blogging application, you’re going to need to make sure that you have a way of syndicating your posts. Today’s blog readers rely heavily on newsreaders and RSS feeds to let them know when their favorite blogs have added new posts. If you are not using an RSS feed, you’re missing out on this enormous market.
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and it works by sending out a snippet of your posts to those that have subscribed to your feed. Most blogging applications contain an automatic RSS feed, but you will need to make sure that it works. We also recommend using an RSS feed manager such as Feedburner to see how many people are reading your posts. This can really help you gauge your success.
These are just three techniques that make blogging much easier. Remember, it is better to err on the side of caution and get help in managing your blog than it is to try it on your own.
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Originally posted 2008-07-30 05:28:01. Republished by Old Post Promoter
If you’re ready to get into corporate blogging, you need to make sure that you are going in with the right attitude. There is a big difference between starting an okay blog and starting a stellar blog. You are in this to succeed, so you need to make sure that you are using the right techniques and mindset to accomplish this. Mediocrity is never a good thing, and in blogging, this is particularly true.