Best big business blogs
If you’re a small business, one of the best ways to capitalize on your size is to play up the personal aspect. Best way to do this? Create a blog on your site.
But even the most 2.0 literate of us have trouble creating something that’ll boost your search profile and give your visitors something consistently compelling to read. The ideal blog ticks three boxes
- It’s free: The blog is there for everyone to read.
- It’s frequently updated: the blog is maintained regularly, preferably by a number of people
- It’s good: Most importantly, it offers relevant, up-to-date information that its readers find valuable
Interestingly, the companies that are most in need of a ‘human touch’ are the larger ones. Given the size of some of these organizations, the challenge for them to create a blog that dispels the ‘corporate monolith’ feel is a big one. It’s particularly useful, then, to see how they go about it, and to note where they succeed and where their blogs fall flat.
A good example is the Telstra enterprise blog. With a large list of contributors, the blog is centered around developments in communication technology and the effects these have on consumers. Inevitably, the posts make much of Telstra’s value in this field. Despite this, the blog is well written and inventive makes for informative reading. It’s particularly useful if you find it difficult keeping abreast of overarching developments in the world of communications.
The NRMA motoring blog approaches the balance between business promotion and reader interest very carefully. Shameless self-promotion would be an easy trap for an insurance blog to fall into. Luckily, this blog has someone clever writing it. Everyone who drives feels strongly about certain issues, be they school zones, roundabouts, how to use GPS etc., and here all of these are addressed in an engaging and provocative way whilst subtly referencing NRMA products.
If you’re concerned about the time it takes to upload new content, maybe you should take a card from the Air Asia pack. This blog consists primarily of posts by its employees about their global holiday experiences, so it reads like a travel blog. It also encourages customers to contribute blog posts about their travels with the airline, offering travel prize-packs as incentive. It solves the ‘talking about your business’ vibe that many blogs have, as well as increasing the personal feel of the site by getting customers to read what other customers have said about their experiences using the airline.
As is Dr. Christine Bennetts (MBF’s chief medical officer) health tips blog on the MBF website. This is another blog that offers completely free, informed information that is relevant to reader’s contemporary health concerns. The content is at once personally valuable and related to the product of it’s parent site, although it avoids explicit promotion entirely.
Which do you think best achieves the goals of a business blog?
