Consistency is one of the hallmarks of building trust. Without it, your customers and clients won’t know if they can depend on you. With it, you could have a loyal customer for life.
One way to prove your perceived trustworthiness and foster confidence in your brand is to deliver a top-notch digital experience. And part of delivering that experience is to create and maintain a high-quality and consistent blog related to your company, relevant topics in your industry, and current events that overlap with your business.
Keeping up a great blog isn’t as easy as most people think. It takes a lot of hard work ─ from topic ideation to creating an editorial calendar to outlining and drafting, editing, re-writing, optimizing for SEO, posting, and then frequently updating older posts. Great results don’t always come early, and they’re never guaranteed.
But if you choose interesting topics, write for your audience and not yourself, and post new articles at regular intervals, you should have a good chance at success.
Frequent Content Means Frequent Readers
Simply put, if you’re going to have a blog section on your website, you need to be updating your content on a timely and consistent basis. Blogging is an essential component of any good web strategy, but blogging erratically is almost as bad as not having a blog at all.
Seeing weeks or even months pass without new entries gives the appearance of disinterest and stagnation. After a few weeks without a new blog post, your potential customers might think you’re not writing anymore because you’ve run out of things to say. Or, perhaps your users might think your blogging activity stopped because your business is struggling and you’re allocating your resources elsewhere to keep the ship afloat. Either way, a decline in blogging frequency will likely be perceived as a decline in the health of your company.
Failing to keep a consistent blogging schedule not only gives the appearance of a struggling or stagnating business, but it’s also a wasted opportunity to engage with potential customers and keep them informed about who you are as a company and what you represent.
The Key to a Great Blog: A Great Editorial Calendar
One best practice that we follow here at LaFleur is to develop our editorial calendars months in advance. This allows us to organize and schedule our content while continually ideating to stay up-to-date with current events and trending topics. If we discover a topic that we feel is more timely or better suited for a client than what we already have, we can swap it out in real time. If not, then we know we have a plan in place and never have to scramble for a topic at the last minute.
Maintaining a useful and detailed editorial calendar filled with interesting, relevant topics might seem like a chore, but if your marketing content team is constantly discussing potential ideas in an email thread, Slack channel, or monthly team meeting, you won’t fall behind. You’ll have the luxury of choosing the best topics from a curated list rather than settling on what your team has come up with at the last minute.
Even if you are only blogging once or twice each month, be sure to post consistently and without fail. Trust your marketing content team to harvest great ideas and to put them into action. A short piece about a company event or internal promotion might seem perfunctory or uninteresting, but believe us, it’s far better than not posting at all.
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When to Publish New Blog Articles
If you’re going to keep your blog running smoothly, you need to establish a consistent posting day and time so that your readers know when to expect new content. If they’re truly interested in what you have to say (or even if they’re on the fence), they’ll want to know exactly when to check in so they can read your latest article.
In fact, a recent industry study found that nearly half of buyers viewed between three and five pieces of content before finally engaging with a sales representative. So don’t be discouraged if you aren’t seeing results in the first few weeks or even the first few months of blogging; stick with it and make sure your audience knows when to expect dazzling new content!
As to the question of when is the best time to publish a new blog post, marketers continue to disagree over the answer. In general, marketing research shows that most users prefer to read blogs in the morning, and overall activity drops as the day goes on. In addition, Mondays are the most popular day for blog visits, although Saturdays usually drive the most user comments.
If your goal is to receive more inbound links (one of the most important and challenging aspects of SEO), Mondays and Thursdays around 7 a.m. will be your best bet. Furthermore, research shows that posting more than once each day will more than double the amount of page views and inbound links you receive.
If your company is looking to increase your social media presence or already has a strong foothold in that arena, you should consider your social media posting schedule just as carefully. Social media activity reaches its zenith during the weekend, especially Saturdays, but most sharing activity occurs during the middle of the week between Tuesdays and Thursdays, especially during non-popular posting times (9 p.m. – midnight EST). Therefore, the best policy is to post blog content during the mornings early in the week and then upload those posts to your various social properties in the early evenings.
How to Write Quality Blog Articles on a Consistent Basis
As stated above, it can be difficult to come up with interesting topics and quality blog articles week after week, but there are a few things you can do to help spur your imagination. Follow these tips and you should have no problem filling your editorial calendar with fascinating and timely ideas. Read for business and pleasure: Reading keeps your mind sharp and introduces you to new concepts and perspectives. Whether you’re reading a trade publication or a paperback novel, the simple act of ingesting and digesting the written word can inspire you to alter your writing style or view old ideas in a new light.
Obviously, we all lead busy lives, but we recommend encouraging your content creators to read a few hours each week during work whenever they have the time to do so. It’s a practice that is equal parts relaxing and rewarding. And if you and your staff don’t have the time to read, consider purchasing a few audio books for the office and renting them out for the daily commute! Don’t wait ─ ideate! When that eureka moment strikes, you need to take advantage. This doesn’t mean it’s necessary to pull to the side of the road and spew 1,500 words of eloquent, spell-binding prose, but it is important to jot down your ideas whenever they hit you.
Carry around a small notebook to keep track of new topics or even just plug them into the notes application or record a quick voice memo on your smartphone or tablet. Whatever you do, don’t assume the idea will just be waiting for you when you want to recall it at the office tomorrow. It won’t, so write it down or lose it forever! Diversify your delivery: There’s nothing written in stone that says you absolutely must release a 1,200-word blog every week. If things are starting to feel stale, you can always update your content format to include:
- Videos
- Infographics
- PowerPoint presentations
- Interviews
- Podcasts
- GIFs (animated images)
- Poetry
You are the master of your content, so you get to decide what you want to publish. But make sure to go back and check the analytics of each post so that you can gauge the effectiveness of different approaches. After all, poetry and animated GIFs aren’t for everyone.
In general, remember to read, ideate, and diversify. Always keep a notebook handy, and make sure all your blog content ideas get transferred to an organized and flexible editorial calendar. Remember these steps, and blog readership will follow.
Contact LaFleur Today to Increase the Quality and Web Traffic of Your Blog
If you’re considering starting a company blog, or if you already have a blog but are finding it difficult to maintain quality and consistency, LaFleur may be the content marketing partner you’re looking for. Our content team is composed of skilled and experienced writers who have helped dozens of businesses nationwide increase their web presence and sales.
To learn more about how we can help with your blog marketing efforts, please give us a call today at 888-222-1512 or complete the brief form on this page. We’re here to help, but we can’t get started until you reach out. Don’t keep banging your head against the proverbial writer’s block. Contact us today so we can get started delivering great content that helps grow your business.
RELATED: Our Editorial Process for Creating Truly Outstanding Web Content
References
Bolsinger, K. (2017). Chapter 11: Blogging. The beginner’s guide to social media. Moz. Retrieved from https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-social-media/blogging
Moon, G. (2016, January 20). When is the best time to publish blog posts? CoSchedule. Retrieved from https://coschedule.com/blog/best-time-to-publish-a-blog-post/
Smarty, A. (2017, October 2). How to blog consistently without burning out. HubSpot. Retrieved from https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/how-to-blog-consistently-burning-out
The ultimate list of marketing statistics. (2017). HubSpot. Retrieved from https://www.hubspot.com/marketing-statistics?__hstc=191390709.aec1e54f85e16f4804f5dafe9c392774.1507073695441.1507073695441.1507073695441.1&__hssc=191390709.3.1507073695441&__hsfp=85180081
