Why Your Blog Is Your Business’s BFF

5 Effective Business Blogging Strategies Rick Perry Missed

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyHPihyhKLk

Rick Perry’s “oops moment” at the CNBC Michigan Presidential debate where he forgot the third government agency he planned to eliminate underscores the importance of having a business blog. In this type of PR crisis, a blog can be a BFF to get Rick Perry or your business’ perspective out instantly without waiting for next traditional news cycles.

The fifty-three second video of Perry’s brain freeze went viral before the end of the debate. While Perry tried to do damage control on the next morning news cycle and later on the Letterman Show, the video had already surpassed 1 million views in addition to garnering 7,000 comments. His unlikely savior was CNBC’s copyright claim that removed the video from YouTube and other sites that had embedded the clip.

In honor of Rick Perry’s brain freeze, here are three ways a blog can help your business present its case without waiting for the next news cycle. Ideally, this should be at the core of your Crisis Management Plan.

1. A blog offers a publishing platform to get your message out fast. Perry’s site, like this one, runs on WordPress, a blogging platform that powers 15% of the top million websites and provides all the tools needed for a quick response.
2. A blog can push content to your audience via email and as alerts from Google, Yahoo and others. Its RSS feeds can reach many more readers further disseminating your message widely and quickly.
3. A blog distributes content to social media platforms via APIs. Integrate your blog with the appropriate social media networks such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to share your message more broadly.

Beyond being a media outlet, a blog should be at the heart of your social media strategy. To this end, Ron Paul was right in correcting Perry that the magic number was five since five elements are needed to ensure your business blog is an effective marketing machine.

1. A communications strategy. At the core, this lays out what your talking points are. Ideally, a business has an editorial calendar that lays out its content messaging across platforms on a regular cycle. This communications plan isn’t do-it-once-and-forget-about-it. It requires experienced professionals to monitor and react to the environment in real-time. They must know your business and your brand and be senior enough to make a business decision. In Perry’s case, there should have been a response waiting for him when he stepped off the stage.
2. Establish a base of thought leadership. While you can start a blog after an issue goes viral, you’re better positioned if you’ve been working with a base of published content validating your standing. To this end, blog at least two to three times a week and having a minimum of fifty blog posts published, each focused on one of your organization’s keyword terms since this concurrently supports your search optimization efforts.
3. Cultivate your following. Grow your audience before you need them. Specifically, attract a readership for your blog, people who regularly return to your blog. Also, build your house file of email addresses (and mobile alerts where appropriate); they receive your blog posts or other house emailings. What’s critical is permission to contact them. Along with these efforts, develop an engaged following on relevant social media platforms. You can’t just show up because you have a problem and expect people to listen to you. You must be available and engaged before a problem arises.
4. Encourage conversation. Be available on the social media platforms that are most relevant to your business. Ensure that your agents are trained and know your social media guidelines. Listen to what your fans and detractors are saying. Before ignoring the negative comments, examine whether there’s value in what’s being said. Use the breadth of platforms and contact points to engage.
5. Leverage technology. Facilitate information distribution, minimize distribution time, and ensure you have the capacity to handle usage spikes to keep your blog, website and other relevant systems going regardless of traffic loads or area interruptions. Have personnel ready to implement any business, marketing and/or communications initiatives on a moment’s notice and get additional resources, such as bandwidth, as a backup reserve.

When it comes to brain freezes, it’s important to react quickly and effectively to get your message out. At times like these, your business blog can be your BFF, especially if you have the resources in place to support your efforts.

What else would you recommend to leverage a business blog to overcome an Oops moment?

Happy marketing,
Heidi Cohen

Here are some related articles to help you.

• 10 Reasons your boss doesn’t want a blog and why he’s wrong
• Who will write our company blog?
• Blog post length: Does size really matter? 
• How different types of blogs stack up.
• How to turn your professional blog into a lead generating machine.