Blog best practices

Posted Wednesday, August 20, 2008 by Chris Baggott

So I was privileged to teach a session on Advanced Business Blogging at the recent Blog Indiana event in Indianapolis. I learned a lot and there were some really smart people with some really good ideas and advice for Blogging in general and Corporate Blogging specifically.

But there was a LOT of Bull S--- too. I'm not normally one to go negative but some of this stuff makes me so mad that smoke comes out of my ears.

Blog Indiana Bad Business Blogging Advice, Comment Monitoring

The experience has given me an idea for a whitepaper: "Top Ten Lies about Business Blogging" (once I calm down, I'll probably change the word Lies to Myths)

This person (who's name escapes me) was doing a session on Business Blogging as well. A woman asked about comments and explained that her CEO wouldn't let them start a company blog unless he could review and reject comments he didn't like.

The advice?? Basically, it's better not to do a blog at all if you are going to actively manage comments!

I was incredulous.   Of course a corporation has to monitor not only comments, but blog posts as well. There is a lot of responsibility and liability for anything that appears on your site...including your blogs.

If Blog Benefits = 100%   Comments in general represent < 10% of that benefit.

The reality is that most business blogs never get that many comments anyway. Comments should never be used as a primary gage of success.   Think about Traffic, Search Engine Optimization and Conversions. Those are the real metrics of blogging best practices.

So my surprise was this idea that if you are not 100% you shouldn't do anything at all was just bad advice.

Stay tuned...I've got another 9 to go :-)

Comments (2)

Google remains "top dog" in the search engine pack.

Posted Thursday, August 14, 2008 by Lindsey Young

We like to provide all of our clients and prospects with accurate, fresh data when it

comes to what search engines like . I often find myself referring to Google for search engines like I might refer to Kleenex for a facial tissue. Clients will often ask if we are just focused on Google. The answer is "not really". The algorithm is basically the same for all of the big players: Google, Yahoo, and MSN. However the market share is truly held by our "do no evil" friends at Google.

The latest data from www.searchenginewatch.com: "Google is pulling in 62% of the online searches, with Yahoo at a distant second with 20%". When it comes to blogging best practices when focusing on SEO, you truly have to consider where the majority of your organic results will lie. Good luck and keep blogging!

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A Battle of the Greats

Posted Wednesday, August 13, 2008 by Kristen Hanschu

You might not be aware of this, but the greatest spectacle on earth is taking place right now. No, I am not talking about the Beijing Olympics. What I am talking about is the Compendium Blogware Blogging Tournament of Champions.

As it is also commonly referred to as "Content for the Crown", this tournament is an all out fight to the death. Well, not really. It is, however, a tournament to determine which of our clients is producing more content than all the others.

In round 1, we have two of our greats going up against one another. Roto-Rooter and Conclusive Marketing are two of our clients that constantly produce well organized and informative content. They continually follow "blogging best practices" by producing at least two blog posts per blogger each week. Their dedication to constantly updated content certainly pays off for them. Not only do they see their blogs ranking on the first page of Google, but they are both receiving more traffic. Coincidence, we know not.

Good luck to both teams. We look forward to reading your blog posts. To view the brackets, click here.

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Page titles are so money. By money, of course, I mean search-awesome.

Posted Monday, August 11, 2008 by mikey mioduski

If any of you are just getting the hang of this SEO thing, like me, you, like me, may have recently discovered the grande importance of page titles in SEO. This is relevant to blog titles as well.

In his whitepaper, What is Blogging’s Role in Search Engine Optimization & the Social Networking Phenomenon?, Compendium Blogware Co-Founder and CEO Chris Baggott quotes SEO expert Steven Bradley:

By far the most important piece of writing you’ll do on any given page is your page title. Search engines consider your page title to be very indicative of what can be found on the page.

Chris goes on to make the following recommendations.

Think about your keyword strategy for PPC and use that as a guide for your blog titles. For example, if ExactTarget wants to rank well on the search term “blogging best practices,” they should name a blog this. And by “name,” I mean that they should title it “blogging best practices.” Titling by the appropriate keyword phrase is a highly scaleable strategy, meaning that ultimately, you would have a blog titled with every one of your PPC keywords.

Along those lines, here are some tips:
• When writing page titles, place your keywords as close to the front of the title as you can.
• Don’t “stuff” with keywords. Titles still need to be readable and need to convince someone to click on them, even in the organic results. (Remember, it’s the actual page title that will show as your result and link in the search results. Obviously results that include the search terms that the searcher has used will be the most compelling ones!).
• Be wary of using titles such as “Rob’s Ramblings.” Every blog should have a meaningful title that includes specific keyword phrases for which you want to rank.

Page titles are money. They're like this huge bear, with these massive claws. Search engines are like this cute little bunny, and if you don't have a relevant and powerful blog title, that little bunny's going to slip away off to some other big bear's cave. Search engines love blog titles, and we should too.

So I changed my blog title to something that may be more search-awesome, in hopes of catching that beautiful baby bunny. We'll see what happens. Who's the big winner here tonight in Indianapolis? Anyone blogging for business that's who.

Author's note: I refrained form embedding one of my all-time favorite scenes from Swingers here, as there is no made for tv version that I could find on YouTube. If you know of the whereabouts of the bear-claws-rabbit scene online, sans colorful language, please comment on this post! Gracias.

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Corporate Team Building

Posted Thursday, August 7, 2008 by Kaila Woodside

A few weeks back Compendium took a weekend to do a little team building - via white water rafting. The trip was amazing and everyone came back with a new energy and feeling of real camaraderie. Wilderness Voyaguers, my rafting company of choice in Ohiopyle is actually one of Compendium's clients. So as opposed to blogging immediately after our trip on our blog - I made a guest post on the WV blog. You can check it out here.

Wilderness Voyaguers has taken to blogging for search and they keep their blog updated with fun happenings in Ohiopyle as well as infromation on the trips they offer. Following blogging best practices with the help of their Client Success Manager, Sarah Sedberry- they will surely be one of our next top corporate bloggers.

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Video and Business Blogging: Fun and Profitable

Posted Thursday, July 31, 2008 by Chris Baggott

Big Corporatations try and make things so complicated. I always say that innovation starts at the bottom...the so called Minor Leagues. Think sports marketing, everything cool in sports marketing (bat night, concerts, fireworks...even frisbee dogs) started in Minor League Baseball.

This is especially true in business blogging. With the advent of Affordable blogging software, some of our best bloggers turn out to be coming not from the ivory towers of the fortune 500, but from the SMB's. Forget Jonathan Schwartz or Robert Scoble...

If you want to emulate great Blogging Best Practices, pay attention to Lizan Brand.

Lizan is focused on Blogging for Search. She highlights high value and unusual products using all the best SEO tactics including the right keywords, geo targeting and blended search favorites like video. Why?

So when someone is looking for a specific product or a drink recipe in Greenfield or any of the surrounding communities like the big city of Indianapolis, she's the number one choice.

As a result, she has been featured in the Indianapolis paper which is over 20 miles from her store. This week she was featured in DMNews (trust me, she doesn't consider herself a direct marketer) and the things that she blogs about, she is now buying by the case. This is the best thing about Business Blogging, telling a great story about things that move your business forward.

Sure Greenfield Liquors sells 6 packs of cold Miller Lite, but her profits come from high end wine and Liquor. Blogging on these topics rings the cash register.

Watch this video and see if you don't end up thirsting for a Root Beer Cocktail :-)

Comments (3)

Finding Time to Blog

Posted Monday, July 28, 2008 by Jim Hyslop

It seems as we move along in this new realm of blogging with a corporate focus for search engine optimization and return on investment one of the largest concerns expressed by management is access to the resources necessary to make a corporate blog successful. What we need to remember here is blogging is simple. Do not over think it. We all know a lot about our business but we don't have to get it all out in a single post. That is the Beauty of a blog.It is not America's next best selling novel instead it is a coffee talk conversation and should be focused on human engagement.

Best practices in blogging- by Compendium tell us that these posts should take 10 -15 minutes MAX! 200-250 words MAX! Remember...the key to SEO is recency and frequency of your blog posts NOT how much you say per post. So don't be worried about who will contribute and how much lost productivity may come from people needing to allocate time to blogging, instead think of it this way, by allowing people within your organization the 20-30 minutes they need each week to contribute a couple posts they will actually be building your lead generating machine.

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Is Blogging Only for SEO Wrong?

Posted Friday, July 25, 2008 by Ali Sales

Blogging for SEO isn't wrong, but it can't be your only goal. Why? Because it's the tip of the iceberg. Of course you want your business to get found through search as many ways as possible, but your goal can't stop there.

You want a prospect to find your business blogs through search, and then what?

There is a next step. What is it? You want them to find one of your corporate blogs and then read sixteen posts before leaving the page? You want them to find one of your blogs and then subscribe to an RSS feed in order to come back over and over again and do nothing but read?

You see what I'm getting at here of course.

Your corporate blogging strategy can't focus on only the search engine optimization aspect. SEO is a means to the end, and your end is to make money by creating new relationships. That's it. If someone clicks to your blog from search and finds a webpage that's impersonal, unprofessional, and full of pointless information, then your blogging program is completely falling flat.

Today Compendium's very own Chris Baggott, will be hosting a webinar that goes into more detail on these topics. The webinar will also cover blogging tips, blogging best practices, and more. This is a great opportunity to ask any burning blogging questions. Get details and sign up for the webinar here.

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Corporate Blogging from another voice.

Posted Friday, July 25, 2008 by Sarah Sedberry

Douglas Karr touched on a topic near and dear to our hearts here at Compendium Blogware in his post yesterday: Blogging for Business: New Tricks for Old Dogs.

Douglas does a great job breaking down how blogs are emerging as a marketing source for companies.

He addresses the pitfalls businesses are falling into, such as:

Dull conversations aren’t attracting readers
Business blogs turn into regurgitated press releases.
The topics don’t spark comments or trackbacks.
The posts lack personality and thought leadership.

"In short, the reason why business blogs are failing are because corporations are substituting a blogging application for their content management system."

At Compendium Blogware we help focus your posts and give you the tools to help make your corporate blog successful. We stress blogging for a purpose and assist in creating a strategy with your business to get a return on your investment.

Douglas also touches on what they can do to ensure success.

"Gaining authority and search engine results"
           - This is part of the package with Compendium - our expertise in SEO"

"Implementing a blogging platform that guides the blogger effortlessly through the posting process"
         - Our platform allows the user to easily create and post content, provides a                 list of keywords to focus on, and an indicator letting the blogger know                     how strong their post is.

"Blogging is a not an overnight success. Great blogging results require momentum and constant analysis and improvement."
           - Our Client Success Team is here to provide support and guidance                             regarding content ideas, best practices, tips and tricks to keep the                         process simple and stress-free.

Another feature of our platform is that there is an administrative layer that monitors the content that ends up published.

These are all reasons why Compendium Blogware can be the best answer for any business looking to begin a corporate blog.

(Also a thanks to Douglass for the plug!) :o)

Comments (0)

Write Like a Blogger

Posted Thursday, July 24, 2008 by Kristen Hanschu

One of the blogging problems that people constantly wrestle with is how long their content should be. In the world of blogging there are two types of people that you will typically run into. One is the "thought leader-must write an essay" type. The second is the "keep it simple so people will read this" type. Which type are you?

We tell our clients that best practices for a blog post is anywhere from 2-5 paragraphs. This keeps your readers engaged. They are able to find what they need in a blog post rather than digging through piles of information. If you find yourself writing posts that are 10, 11, and 12 paragraphs then it is time to shorten them up. You can also split them up into several posts or have them as a series of posts. Big League Tours is a client of mine that does a fantastic job with this.

Of course, you will still be seen as a thought leader even though you are not writing essays. The next time you go to post a blog, keep these blogging tips in mind. If you are spending an hour typing up a post, that is way too much time. Remember to keep it short and to the point. You will gain new readers and people will potential subscribe to your blog because they will care about what you have to say.

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Chris Baggott on the Blog Squad today!

Posted Thursday, July 24, 2008 by Sarah Sedberry

The Blog Squad is dedicated to providing best practices and tactics to getting found on the web.

Today at 5pm, EST – Chris Baggott is being interviewed by the Blog Squad. If you get a chance, please tune in. You can register here: http://www.blogsquadteleseminars.com/baggott/

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Increasing Referral Sites

Posted Tuesday, July 22, 2008 by Sarah Sedberry

As a Client Success Manager here at Compendium, it is my responsibility to stay on top of my clients blogging efforts and to help guide them with best practices in blogging.

The first and foremost important thing about having a successful blog is posting frequent content. Best practices are to blog a minimum of 2 posts per week, per individual blogger.

We have several clients who are doing a phenomenal job of this; Visit Tampa Bay and Big League Tours are just two examples. Due to their frequency of posting their SEO rankings are following suit, as well as, sites referring traffic to them.

A key tactic that these corporate blogs are using is simply putting links in their posts, referring readers to other sites for articles, pictures, more information, etc... Search Engines LOVE the traffic that is generated by these embedded links.

Whats more is that if you start to link out to other sites, they will start to link back to you (as long as your content is relevant). Then as readers are perusing their sites, it will direct traffic to your blog. Therefore increasing your traffic, number of referring sites, number of new visitors, and ultimately the number of potential consumers!

For more information on how to begin building links into your blog posts, check out this article, from SEOBook.com, on 101 Link Building Tips. It provides insight on link baiting and multiple ideas on how an individual can add links to blog posts.

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Managing Time AND Blogging

Posted Tuesday, July 22, 2008 by Jenni Edwards

Lately, I have been serious about getting better time management and organizational practices in place as lately I seem to have been a day late and a dollar short too many times --- and mostly, at my own fault. Although, the picture isn't actually my desk --- it sometimes feels as if I am not too far off of this mess!

Being a start-up at Compendium it's been too common for me to get distracted with big picture conversations (i.e. - How business blogging will change the face on online marketing?) and personnel/procedure changes have also contribute to some time wasted. I am working on focusing on the day to day things that I need to do to introduce more prospects to Compendium and grow our client base --- and with some help from some new Salesforce reports and dashboards, have been trying to do just that.

So in saying this --- I also am trying to get more organized about blogging itself. It seems as if lately I either have so many topics to blog about or nothing at all and that steady stream of content that blogging for SEO needs is lost out on -- thankfully, there are many of my colleagues within Compendium that are stepping up their blogging game and luckily, with our unique software which allows for all of our content to compend into keyword driven blogs; my organization and time management woes don't impact our overall blogging success as much as if I was the lone blogger.

Here are some of the ideas I am hoping to use to organize my own personal blog entries and would love other suggestions that you all might use!

Writing down blog ideas in the same place (whiteboard, notebook) rather than a million different places.
Not writing for perfection the first go around...rather go back and editing the post 30 minutes later with a clear view.
Sticking to my set aside 1/2 hour to blog on Tuesdays and Thursdays (and hopefully being inspired enough to get an additional post in over the weekend).
Looking at my blog and other Compendium employee blogs before blogging --- What are some good ideas? Did I just talk about this? Is this relevant to the reader?

Hope this is relevant to you --- blogging isn't hard, but just as in everything in life; being organized makes it even easier!

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Search Marketing, and the Catalog Industry

Posted Monday, July 21, 2008 by Chris Baggott

So let's talk Business Blogging for B2C organizations.   As many of you know I came originally from the Catalog business. Catalog frustration is what drove me to Email Marketing in the first place.   As far as Compendium Blogware goes, B2C is half our business.

I just spent $2500 with a company called Frongate for some stuff in a new garage I just built.   I didn't go to Frontgate as a destination or through direct navigation, but found them after a long painstaking series of searches looking for some specific floor mats my neighbor has.

It probably took me 15 minutes of searching to find the right product.   I was happy with the transaction (so far) and the good news for Frontgate is that I not only bought the mats, but wound up being upsold with some grade-A shelving as well. Frontgate's mats were by far the most expensive as well.

But I couldn't find them.   My search was painful. I went to a lot of sites that either didn't have the right product I was looking for or that the quality was suspect.    Remember...the searcher isn't going to call the thing the same thing you call it. Frontgate isn't found searching 'garage mats', 'garage floor mats', or even using one of the names that Frontgate calls, them 'industrial grade garage flooring'. If you seach 'PVC floor covering' Frontgate is found on the bottom of the first page.

Uhhhh.....I didn't know I was looking for PVC....thought that was for plumbing....

So how could advanced business blogging help in this environment?

Compendium Blogware post about Frontgate catalog marketing and my garage

Suppose they send me an email asking me why I need this product? ...ask me to tell them about my new garage and mention you are looking for stories for their blog.   I'm so excited about this stupid garage I would probably send pictures and tell them all about why I built it, what I put in it, how I'm outfitting it and how I'll use this Frontgate stuff.

That's all there is to it.

And it's totally a blogging best practice. Frontgate gets a great post and the searcher now gets terrific relevant content to more easily help the next searcher more easily find all the stuff I struggled to find.   The searcher is thrilled, Frontgate is thrilled and as far as I'm concerned I'll never visit a Frontgate blog again...until I have another search that they can serve...

I promise I'm not likely to subscribe to a garage blog or make any comments...I've got a life....and I did subscribe to their email & I'm sure I'll be getting a catalog every month :-)

A blog strategy like this could generate literally hundreds of relevant blogging posts a week.   Combined this with widespread employee blogging on the products and you have not only a winning search engine marketing strategy...but a lot more happy prospects clicking through to buy.

Comments (1)

Forrester: B2B Blogging Takes Nose Dive

Posted Tuesday, July 15, 2008 by Chris Baggott

I'm generally a fan of Forrester and their research, and they have done some terrific work on blogging in general.   But in the newest paper which is mis-named: Derive Value From B2B Blogging comes off as really negative generally with regard to the state of B2B Blogging Solutions & implementations.

There are some terrific points in this paper for B2B marketers as it relates to Corporate Blogging and Blogging Best Practices. For example:

...many B2B marketers are failing to realize that good blogging style should resemble a coffee shop conversation, not a whitepaper.

But the sentence below really describes the overall tone of the paper:

Corporate bloggers are apparently struggling to sustain a conversation...

What is broken in the Forrester study is the overall "goal".   They keep talking about conversation, community, comments, and repeat visitors as the main objective of corporate blogging.   These are metrics that are doomed to fail.

Successful business blogs have two characteristics.

First, rather than top down from the "C" level, they open up by having widespread employee participation.    Prospects and Customers are not the ones to write frequently about your business....but you hire smart, passionate people who like their jobs, like the customer, are proud of your products....let them blog about it.

Secondly, ROI need to be measured based on search & conversion.   Blogging is a content and engagement strategy.    Widespread employee blogging generates lots of great topic specific, keyword, frequently updated and authentic content.    The more content you generate like this, the more traffic you generate. Most successful Corporate Blogging programs in our system drive three times or more traffic than their traditional sites.

When the searcher lands on a page with a post that specifically matches their search intent...written by a real human being and addressing a similar situation...they convert. They take the next step in the relationship.

The business blog is basically a one shot encounter. They search, they find the blog, they convert to either email, phone or a sales relationship (if we are talking about B2B)

Blogging for search is legitmate, valued by the searcher and highly effective if executed properly.

Comments (3)

If you don't blog, how do you tell stories?

Posted Monday, July 14, 2008 by Chris Baggott

Seth Godin has a quote at the beginning of "All Marketers are Liars".

"Either you are going to tell stories that spread, or you will become irrelevant."

Websites are for facts and figures.....blogs are for stories. Every company has stories that come up every day. Customer interactions, product innovations, problems solved. An employee based blogging strategy empowers your people to tell these stories! it's a business blogging best practice.

Compendium Blogware is a perfect example. As a blogging software company in Indianapolis we empower all of our employees to participate in our blog strategy....they blog, the software organizes the content around keywords and topics.

Not only do we drive a ton of organic traffic, we get to tell a lot of compelling stories.

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Universal Search & Blended Search....threat or opportunity for business?

Posted Wednesday, July 9, 2008 by Chris Baggott

There has been a lot of talk about the changes in search results brought on by Universal Search & Blended Search.

Basically, what this means is that Google and the other search engines are considering a lot more than just your website SEO when deciding what results to deliver.

Specifically, It's becoming really important to have frequently updated Corporate blogs, pictures and even video to greatly increase your chances of ranking on a wide range of keywords.

Blended Search is actually great for the marketers that are really trying to build trust and engagement with prospects and customers (although in this case we are mostly talking about prospects since your customers typically shouldn't be searching for you).   This is where people really need to rethink everything they have been taught about the Goals for Corporate or Business Blogging. Business blog strategy has to take into account and focus on the goals of Search Engine Optimization and Conversion.

When I read about Blended Search I tend to hear a lot of panic that these new strategies are both hard and expensive.   BALONEY.

Let me introduce you to my friends & client of Compendium Blogware, Greenfield Liquors. This is a tiny small town liquor store in Greenfield Indiana and they totally take advantage of Web 2.0 marketing strategies and business blogging with very little effort and lots of great results.    Take a look at this Video that appeared in their blog.     The winery featured is Paige 23.

Paige 23 Wine from Compendium Blogware Post on Blended Search

Now, Type Paige 23 wines, Greenfield into your google search box and see what happens.

Home run! Another great example of a Blogging Best Practice. Blog management software for business is affordable and easy. Try it!

www.compendiumblogware.com

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Blogging Excuse #1

Posted Thursday, July 3, 2008 by Kristen Hanschu

The number one excuse that I get from people who are not blogging twice a week is...not enough time. I really can't say that not having extra time is an "excuse" because I have found myself in the same boat.

How do I get around this? I schedule it into my calendar. I set aside two times a week, one hour total, for blogging. The only way to be found on the web is to continually write new content. This post for example is only 3 paragraphs, however, it will still be searched by Google and eventually ranked. Blog best practices says that an individual post should be no more than 5 paragraphs long. Readers tend to stay engaged with shorter posts.

Some good examples of clients who are using our blogging software are BabyPlus, Estridge, Big League Tours, and Cutera. You can view their blogs to get an idea of the type of posts people stay engaged with.

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The love/hate relationship...

Posted Thursday, July 3, 2008 by Sarah Sedberry

I am an athlete; I always have been, and always will be. I was a 3-sport athlete growing up, as well as, played a varsity sport in college. Upon graduation I picked up multiple recreational sports, along with a relatively unknown sport called adventure racing, in order to keep my competitive spirit quenched.

Someone with my background in sports should be somebody that thrives on working out and staying in shape, which I do. However, it is a love/hate relationship. All of us have experienced, at one time or another, the love hate relationship. The following quote explains my tug-of-war battle better than I ever could:

“People don't always play sports because it's fun. Ask any athlete, most of them hate it, but they couldn't imagine their life without it. It's part of them, the love/hate relationship. It's what they live for. They live for the practices, parties, cheers, long bus rides, invitational’s, countless pairs of different types of shoes, water, Gatorade, and the coaches you hate but appreciate. They live for the way it feels when they beat the other team, and knowing those two extra sprints they ran in practice were worth it. They live for the way they become a family with their team, they live for the countless songs they sing in their head while training all those hours. They live for the competition, they live for the friends, the memories, the pain; it’s who they are.”

- Source Unknown

This same love/hate relationship can be applied to blogging and business. Our clients LOVE the blogging benefits they receive, such as the traffic driven to their pages, the increased results of their call-to-action buttons, and the success of higher page ranking - due to search engine optimization that results from; their users blogging. However, they may HATE the thought having to find the time create and write a post for their company blog.

My suggestion is to pull from your own personal experiences, and use that information to express yourself and your business in your blog post. Besides its YOU that your readers are looking to hear from, so go ahead and give them that personal, human voice!

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Great Blog Example

Posted Tuesday, July 1, 2008 by Kristen Hanschu

Visit Tampa Bay is an excellent example of how a small to medium size business can see success with blogging. They do a fantastic job of following best practices and posting frequently.

Visit Tampa Bay has been blogging for seo (search engine optimization) for a few months and each month they have had the opportunity to gain new clients through this program. They are doing this by winning organic searches on Google, Yahoo, and MSN. In fact, everyone of their keywords is ranking in at least one of these search engines.

If you are having a hard time getting your employees to blog, follow the example that Visit Tampa Bay has set in their blogging strategy. They keep their posts short and to the point. Their bloggers add relevant links and interesting images. To view their blog click here.

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