Starting a Business Blog

Blogging as Your #1 Marketing Tool

Tuesday, March 9, 2010 by Ford McAlexander

A fun fact for everybody: according to Marketing Sherpa, 80-90% of all Clicks happen in the organic section of a search engine page.

Wow! The problem is many companies are not competing for that portion of the search page. They are using sometimes overly priced ad words and at times are relying on usually unreliable SEO firms. Many companies are just unaware that starting a business blog could be your #1 Search Marketing tool.

Compendium Blogware has a webinar to show you how our corporate blogging software could be your solution! Marketing departments need to discover that they do not need to spend thousands of dollars on advertisements that they won't be able to measure their ROI. With the help of Compendium, creating and leveraging a blog can save your company lots of grief and money. Check out the webinar on how a blog can be your #1 search marketing tool.

Blogging for Beginners

Friday, March 5, 2010 by Heather Benfield

So, you've heard the buzz about blogging and you know you should probably find out what it's all about and why everyone is doing it.

But how is blogging going to help your company? and where do you even begin? What will you write about? Who's going to read it?

So many questions to think about and all of the sudden you're feeling overwhelmed and have decided "maybe this blogging thing can wait - I've got more important things to worry about..."

Don't let the business blogger blues get you down just yet! The reality is, business blogging is a vital search marketing tool that's helping drive online demand and convert new business and Compendium is here to help. We've created an exclusive resource kit containing everything you need to know about starting a business blog.

In this ROI toolkit, you'll find:

Results driven case studies
iMedia article, "10 Ways to Boost the Value of your Business Blog."
Whitepaper: How to Measure Blogging ROI
Getting Started Checklist

So what are you waiting for? Download your free kit today!

Debunk Myths about Business Blogging

Friday, February 19, 2010 by Ford McAlexander

I know there are still skeptics out there about corporate business blogging, but Compendium Blogware is here to debunk those myths! Is your company worried that they aren't interesting enough to keep a consistent blog or think your blog will never be found? Never fear, Compendium Blogware has a webinar for you!

One of our highly attended webinars last year was to demystify five myths about business blogging. It was hosted by our Co-Founder and CEO, Chris Baggott, where he addressed issues like the ones I had previously mentioned. I urge you to check out the webinar so you can see that starting a business blog is not only easy but a great way to generate online exposure for your business. You can get a free replay of the webinar right here!

Law Firms Understand the Power of Search Marketing

Tuesday, February 16, 2010 by Megan Glover

I just had an attorney from Maryland email info@compendiumblogware.com with a question about our blogging software. The firm is interested in starting a business blog and found Compendium through searching on Google.

There are two great takeaways from this brief exchange I had with this prospect:

1. He used a keyword search to find a solution to their business need. Just reiterating the power and necessity of search marketing.

2. No company, idea, product and/or service is exempt from search.

When you think of companies that start blogging for business, Law Firms might not be top of mind, but our reality is that some of our best clients are in the law sector. Check out this great Case Study from Alerding Castor Hewitt, LLP. This law firm experienced 500% Return on Investment in their first year with Compendium's Blogging solution.

The Sweet Smell of Success

Wednesday, February 10, 2010 by Heather Benfield

I just had a conversation with one of our client success managers, Jess Wehner, about her eCommerce Client Fairytale Brownies and how they are kicking butt in their blogging program.

I won't keep you waiting any longer - here's the story:

Fairytale Brownies, a Phoenix-based eCommerce company, bakes and ships gourmet brownies and custom gifts. Although the company bakes over 2.5 million brownies annually, they were looking for a better way to market their products online and increase Internet sales.

In August 2008, Fairytale started a business blogging program using Compendium’s enterprise platform in order to increase organic search sales and drive traffic to their eCommerce site, brownies.com.

Within the first year of their program, Fairytale Brownies produced fun, keyword-rich content for 47 blogs driving thousands of visitors to their eCommerce site. From those new prospects, a remarkable 13% converted into highly qualified leads! Although the company does not disclose close ratios and sales dollars, they do report a 170% ROI for their business blogging strategy. Now that’s a sweet return!

Are you looking to accomplish similar goals as Fairytale Brownies? Schedule a free online demo today!

Your employees have better things to do than blogging...right?

Thursday, January 14, 2010 by Ali Sales Roach

You don't want everyone in your organization blogging because they have better things to be doing. They have enough going on in their busy lives and the last thing you want them to do is to take blogging and move it to the top of their priority list --and besides, what's your company even going to gain by starting a business blogging program?

I hear these kinds of comments every day, and while I don't agree with them (of course I don't!) I can certainly understand them.

Your employees are very busy people and you have them working on a lot of important things. Your salespeople can't blog because they need to be selling! Your customer service people can't blog because they need to be serving! Your technology / development people can't blog because they need to be coding!

I get it, I get it.

But here are a couple things to consider:

1. Every day, many of your employees are already spending time out there on the web. They're checking their email, looking at Facebook, doing a quick Twitter update, doing a quick search for a pair of shoes they really want. Come on, I don't live under a rock. I believe there are studies that show the human brain can only function at the highest level of performance for about 20 minutes. That's exactly why most of us take a quick "web break" during the day.

So, if your employees are going to take this "web break," why not give them an outlet to share their thoughts in a way that benefits the company?

2. There are so many advantages to getting employees of all kinds involved in your blogging strategy. You hired smart, passionate people into your organization and the rest of the world (your customers and prospects) need to see them. There's no reason to hide, and even better yet, the more opinions, views, and info you provide from all types of people, the better your chances of someone on the other side identifying with you.

3. Money. I have to break this out as a separate point because blogging can make you money, in the same way that your salespeople or account managers can make you money. We have clients who are making more money from their blogging efforts than any other corporate effort! Seriously! We just had a customer who hasn't even been blogging with us for 2 months tell us yesterday that his blogging program is driving the most qualified demand he's ever seen into his organization. If you're unwilling to let at least some of your people blog, you could be missing out on a whole lot of money.

It's time to put the fears and excuses to bed and get comfortable with what's possible with a powerful blogging software tool like Compendium.

To learn more, check out our whitepaper: Considering Blogging?

E-tailers Investment Plans in 2010

Thursday, November 19, 2009 by jennifer buscher

Just read an interesting article in EMarketer on how advanced e-commerce businesses plan to invest their dollars moving into 2010. The top three additions include:

1. Social Marketing
2. Video
3. Blogs

Nearly 40% of all respondents plan to include these applications. What does this mean? I think this means a number of things... First, social marketing and blogs are not a fade. Adoption is becoming mainstream. Customers want to human buying experience.

So, what to do? It's really simple... start a business blog on an advanced business blogging platform. This should be your cornerstone for content creation. Use video in your content, and then push that content out to your social networks. You can kill three birds with one stone so to speak.

“The last time many retailers installed a new e-commerce platform was five years ago, and those systems aren’t robust enough to support all of the new technology that’s changing the very nature of how consumers are shopping online,” David Fry, founder of Fry Inc., told Internet Retailer. “Smart retailers know they need to implement better technology now or they’ll miss out on the recovery and a big opportunity.”

Moral of the story.... get onboard or you'll miss out!

The Content of Your Blog

Friday, August 28, 2009 by Stephanie West

Many of my friends are interested in that fact that I blog - but they don't quite understand what I blog about.

Ironically, I blog about blogging: blogging for business, blogging at Compendium, blog software, etc.

While all of these are different topics, they all have the same structure of their content. The content of your blog is crucial.

Here are some points to consider within the content of your blog:

The customer only cares about search - so talk about what they searched for!
Don't stuff your blog with unnecessary information.
Put links to other resources or your company website in your blog.
Focus on blog volume. More blogs = More blog traffic.
Lifetime of the blog program: more content within your blog = an increased number of search visits to your blog per month.

For more useful information like this - fill out Compendium's ROI Toolkit to get more information on how to start a business blog.

Yours

Wednesday, July 29, 2009 by Mitch Burk

Your blog is... yours.

Let me repeat myself: YOUR blog is YOURS.

When writing about your product or service, remember... YOU are the expert. YOU are the most qualified person to discuss it. People looking for information about a product or service don't want a review from a third party writer... They want the expert!

When looking on a way to make your online marketing effective, remember to motivate your employees to write... They are going to be the ones who people want to learn from, and they know the most up-to-date news about the company.

If you're looking on information on how to start a business blog and claim a piece of the online marketing world as your own, contact Compendium today and we'll show you where to start!

Discovering the unlimited potential...

Tuesday, July 21, 2009 by Mitch Burk

Up until a few months ago, I had rarely spent time reading blogs or and had very limited experience in the blogosphere. Then, one piece of information entered my life and changed that: My girlfriend loves blogs. And as any good boyfriend should, I tried to take an interest in her interests. Nearly every day she was giving me the newest update from (now nationally known) mckmama and a few other blogs her and her friends followed.

The blogs would spark conversation, usually starting with, "Why don't I write a blog!? It's such a cool concept!" and then, sadly, almost always ending with, "Well, my life can't possibly be interesting enough that anyone would want to read about what I had for lunch today or how my group meeting went last night..."

Prior to finding Compendium, my knowledge on blogs and their usefulness was incredibly limited... I had only seen them as a place for people with interesting lives to talk about them, or for kids who need a creative outlet to go post their poems and pictures.

Enter: Business blog software. Discovering the world of blog marketing was like entering Narnia! You may laugh, but picture it... those "Lion, Witch, and Wardrobe" kids lived in such a limited world with a limited perspective on life and then upon walking through the wardrobe, they discovered a world of limitless possibilities! That is the world the Compendium is offering! Blogs will change your business and show you that you don't have to waste your time, energy, and money on old-school marketing strategies.

I'll be the first to admit, I always put blogs in a box. I didn't understand them and did not see the potential in them... However, it only took a few days at Compendium before I saw the outstanding results that come from the decision to start a business blog.

So, what's your next step? Are you tired of limited business strategies? Take a walk into the world of limitless marketing possibilities and let Compendium show you the way!

iMedia Article - 5 Outstanding Business Blogging Programs

Tuesday, July 14, 2009 by Meghan Manning

Recently an article was released on iMedia Connection authored by Compendium's CEO/CoFounder Chris Baggott.

The article outlines 5 outstanding business blogging programs, check out the complete article here.

So you might be asking yourself - what constitutes as an outstanding blogging program? Well, the answer is simple - Chris addresses this question by stating the following:

"When contemplating this article, the first question I had to address was what exactly qualifies a corporate blog as being "outstanding." To me, an outstanding corporate blogging program is one that accomplishes the clearly articulated goals of the organization."

If you're thinking of starting a business blogging program of your own, review this article and see how easy it can be to fit blogging into your hectic schedule, and you never know, you might be able to run an outstanding blogging program and be featured in the next issue!

Jungle out there...

Thursday, June 25, 2009 by Mitch Burk

Jungles have this reputation of being chaotic, busy, and packed so tight you can't get around, hence the phrase: "It's a JUNGLE out there!" Now, I've never been to a jungle, but I don't really see it being that packed... although there are plenty of animals around, they all have their own areas and things they involve themselves in and I don't think they're getting stuck in animal traffic going to the watering hole...

Many hesitant bloggers would find themselves saying the same phrase about the blogging world: I'm not getting involved... It's a jungle out there!... I looked on multiple websites for statistics and everything I found said there are probably over 100,000,000 blogs in the world right now, so it's no wonder that people may fear getting lost when trying to create business blogs.

It is so important, however, to not let the numbers intimidate you... when your company starts a business blog with Compendium, you become the experts on the matter and you are the most qualified. How many bloggers exist in the world doesn't matter, the thing that matters is that your company is creating plenty of relevant information that is going to increase maximize your SEO and become the best online marketing tool you ever invested in.

How to start a business blog...

Thursday, June 25, 2009 by Mitch Burk

How to start a business blog is a common concern of many business owners looking at diving into the world of blog marketing. And lucky for you, here at Compendium, we make it quick and convenient for you by providing you with a talented team of IT support members, client success managers, product developers, and many more people! We also help to provide you with plenty of information right on our website that makes starting a business blog easy!

Look around our website and you'll find:

Whitepapers outlining many of the specifics about the blogging world and how your company can use blogs to win search.

Case Studies discussing the recent success of many of Compendium's currently clients and how they are capitalizing on blog marketing to create business.

Articles to prove to you that we're not the only ones talking about corporate blogging theses days.

And conveniently enough... all three of these things can be found in our new ROI Toolkit containing all of the above mentioned, as well as a getting started to help the process of starting a business blog go quick and easy for your company!

You don't have blog readers

Friday, June 19, 2009 by Ali Sales Roach

Time to face the brutal facts: unless you're a publisher, you probably aren't going to have a high number of blog readers or RSS subscribers.

Let me share an interesting stat: Across our 400 customers, the average for new visitors to their blogs is over 90%.

What does this mean? It means that only 1 out of 10 people are coming back to read your content; everyone else is showing up for the first time.

What does this mean for marketers? And how does this impact blogging best practices? Well, a couple things:

1. You can repeat yourself.
And considering that one of the number one factors impacting whether your business blogging program will succeed or fail is content, and lots of it. The ability to repeat yourself is a beautiful thing -- you won't be "letting your readers down" by repeating yourself and making the same points over and over again, because this will be the first time they are digesting your blog content. Repetition is key.

2. You can take the pressure off.
Yes, the fuel of your corporate blogging program is content, but every piece of content that you write does not have to be perfect. You are not writing a whitepaper or a novel, you're simply writing something that will quickly capture the attention of someone showing up to your blog for the first time.

When you're considering how to start a business blog, I hope you keep in mind the stat of 90% new visitors. Realizing early on that your blogging program is about conversion and lead generation will free you from the fear of "What will my readers think?" You don't have readers, you have new visitors, and they are just waiting for you to provide them with some good, relevant info and then give them a chance to convert and learn more.

I'm not going to do that, because I haven't done it before!

Tuesday, June 16, 2009 by Lee Jorgenson

Isn't it amazing how "stuck in our ways" we can be?

Growing up, my family always had a dog. As a result, I determined that I hated cats and would never own one. They seemed too prissy, moody, and distant. Then, in college, one of my roommates bought a kitten. Not by my own volition, I was exposed to living with an animal that I actually came to enjoy. My unfounded predisposition was crumpled, and I decided that cats could actually make good companions.

Who cares?

Well, this same principle carries over in business. "Why blog? We've never had a corporate blog before." "I'm not going to start a business blog; it isn't a priority right now." Just because you haven't done it before, doesn't mean it's bad or doesn't work. As a matter of fact, many great successes are born when people decide to try something new.

Wine, Beer, Blogging and SEO

Tuesday, June 9, 2009 by Brian Graham

Blogging for SEO is like finding a great wine or the best beer. Remember when you first explored these landscapes? You made your selection by white or red for wine or light and dark for beer. As you became more educated about the differences and all the varieties available searching for what you were looking for was easier. The differences in a Shiraz and a Pinot Noir are significant. A Munich Helles and an American Lager are worlds apart, literally.

When your potential clients are searching for what you offer they have the same knowledge and are searching on terms that are specific, IE glossy four color printing. When I go to the liquor store I know that I want an Imperial IPA, I am going to ask for exactly that. This is going to narrow down all the other beer styles available and get me to only the Imperial IPA choices.

Blogging as a tool for SEO allows you to help your clients find you and narrow down all the other choices. They have to wade through the sea of other companies out their who may offer the same or similar products or services. They know what they want and you can convert them at a higher rate IF they find you. Help them find YOU! So go grab your favorite Cabernet or IPA and find out how to start a business blog! CHEERS!

A New Way to Generate Leads

Tuesday, June 9, 2009 by Angela Castelli

How do you prospect for your company? Where do your leads come from? Do you network and cold call and buy mass mailing lists in hopes that there are a few qualified leads amongst all of your efforts? This is what I hear from hundreds of companies that I speak to on a daily basis, and they are looking for a new way to generate leads.

What if I told you I could help you to be standing in front of an audience who wants to speak to you? That is exactly what the power of Compendium can do for you and your business. Compendium is a search marketing tool that is going to help you to be found organically in search when someone is searching for you, based on keywords that are relevant to your business. When creating a corporate blog, or starting a business blog, one of your goals should be to generate leads and acquire more customers. If lead generation is a top priority for you and your business, and you'd like to learn how to generate leads online, Compendium Blogware is the only business blogging software available that's easy to use and produces results.

So let's start blogging for leads together. You are a potential lead for Compendium, and you found my blog, didn't you?

How Will You Build Your House?

Thursday, June 4, 2009 by Brett Fritz

The old saying goes, "don't build a house on sifting sand... build it on solid rock!"

You would not build your house like a this card house before consulting with a building contractor who knows what he is doing.

So why would you develop a start a business blog without looking at the blogging best practices?

Be sure to consult with an individual that knows what they are talking about when it comes to blogging. Ask them about their blogging goals and what type of success they are seeing on their business blog. Ask how they are measuring their results - what metrics are put in place with their business blog.

If you have questions about business blogging, Compendium is here to help. For starters, download our Business Blogging Survival Kit.

This kit will help you figure out how to start a business blog on the right foot!

Learn how easy it is to measure your business blogging strategy.

Wednesday, June 3, 2009 by Megan Glover

We recently did a survey with Compendium prospects and asked: What is the biggest obstacle to starting a business blogging strategy?

Hard to Measure was tied as the number one obstacle to starting a strategy. The reality is business blogs are no different to measure than your Website. Below is a snap shot of the template we use to measure the success of our blogs at Compendium.

The screen shot is a little muddy to decipher. but we use Google Analytics and Salesforce.com to capture all of the data we need. Any analytics or CRM package will suffice to capture the relevent data.

Here are the basic variables we capture on a weekly and month-end basis:

1. Unique Visitors (Search, Referral and Direct)

2. Call - To - Action performance (we use Salesforce.com campaigns and web-to-lead forms on every CTA landing page so that we can track indivicual performance).

3. Leads (someone who fills out a web-to-lead form and is funneled into Salesforce.com)

4. Click-through-Rate (the number of unique clicks on a CTA/total unique visitors)

5. Lead Conversion (the number of people who filled out a form/total unique visitors)

6. Bounce Rate

These six marketing metrics give us a great picture as to how we're fairing month over month and give us indicators as to what changes need to be made to increase conversion and ultimately the number of leads we are able to funnel into the sales pipeline.

Just curious, how many of your are measuring your blogs in a similar way and/or do you have additional metrics that you find really helpful?

Congratulations to GK Elite!

Friday, May 29, 2009 by Sarah Sedberry

I wanted to give a give shout out to our client GK Elite, and their blog administrator Andrew Foss.

Recently they were featured in an online article by Internet Retailer regarding their success for their e-commerce site and how the blog has helped drive sales. Congratulations on your success so far!

For more information on how to start a business blog for your company, view a demo now.