Having a corporate voice in social media is no longer recommended—it’s required.
But what should that voice sound like? Corporate social media strategist Debbie Weil has answers.
Named one of the Most Influential Women in Technology this year by Fast Company, Debbie Weil is an author, speaker and corporate social media strategist who helps communicate the value of social media to the C-suite and beyond.
She’s seen it all, and she knows what works and what doesn’t. In this video, she gives the top five ways you can quickly kill your corporate blog. If you prefer reading (sorry, scanning) over watching, here is a text version of the video:
Kill Your Corporate Blog Tip #1
Update as infrequently as possible. The web is littered with corporate blogs that were created with the best of intentions, only to be neglected post-launch.
Avoid this common pitfall by employing Weil’s simple rule of thumb: update your corporate blog three times a month—or once every ten days.
This is an achievable amount in terms of actually getting it done, and it is enough activity to give the blog an “updated” feel. Viewers will see that a post has been added recently and the blog contains fresh content.
Kill Your Corporate Blog Tip #2
Write in corporate speak. People have a natural tendency to tune out buzzwords and “corporate speak” the same way people like to fast-forward through television commercials.
Your corporate blog is a way to share the personality of the people who make up your brand so let them speak like they normally do. And if their normal “voice” is corporate speak? Maybe you should look elsewhere for corporate blog contributors …
Write in a conversational tone and don’t be afraid to show your human side—that’s why social media has caught on, and that’s what people are looking for in the content they interact with online.
Kill Your Corporate Blog Tip #3
SELL, SELL, SELL. Employing the hard sell on a corporate blog is the kiss of death—people are coming for content, not for your sales pitch.
“Don’t sell directly, sell indirectly,” says Weil.
Becoming a thought-leader by providing valuable, useful content to your audience will position you as the type of company they’d like to do business with eventually. This indirect approach will earn you attention in the short-term, and business in the long-term.
Kill Your Corporate Blog Tip #4
Make sure it’s text-heavy. People don’t read online, they scan. Bombarding them with line after line of uninterrupted text is a great strategy if you’re looking to increase your bounce rate and put people to sleep.
Use short bursts of copy with lots of white space, subheads, and bulleted lists. Making your corporate blog airy and open will be more welcoming to your visitors and allow them to more easily digest your content.
Kill Your Corporate Blog Tip #5
Take it very, very seriously. If you take your corporate blog too seriously—no one else will. Either that or they’ll just be bored with it. By default, social media is, well, social, so don’t be the person at the party talking shop constantly when everyone else is just trying to have a good time.
“Blogging is one of the most creative ways to market to and have a conversation with your customers,” says Weil. “If you think of it in that light, you will have a lot more fun, and you will be successful with your corporate blog.”
Related articles
- 4 ways to foster dialogue with corporate blogs (commetrics.com)
- 6 experts on corporate blogging best practices (socialmedia.biz)
- How to Make an Awesome Corporate Blog (entrepreneur.com)
- Why So Few Tweets from the C-Suite? (blogs.hbr.org)
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{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
God I HATE the corporate speak one. No i do not want your integrated optimizied full platform approach. I dont even know what that means
I appreciate your quantifiable interaction on behalf of our brand. Oh, wait, I mean, thanks for the comment.
We have another name for corporate blogs that “sell” all the time, they’re called e-commerce sites.
I agree – there seems to be a lot sites having a bit of an identity crisis out there. By the way, BUY NOW!
Andrew, this was hugely fun to do. Well done on the editing! Wish I had smiled more. I mean, it’s fun to kill a corporate blog, right?!
You killed it. The video that is. (I hope I am forgiven for these puns one day). I’m glad you had fun – we had a lot of fun making it and I’m really happy with how it turned out. You’re a natural. Any time you get the desire to be on screen just let us know.
I think your blog post is spot on, but I’d add one note: I think the blog needs to be updated more than 3x a month. I’d say it has to be once a week (or more.)
I’d say the key to blogging, especially if you’re very busy actually trying to run your business, is to create a schedule and stick to it. Block off an appointment time in Outlook…whatever you need to do to make it consistent.
Be aware of your statistics as well…which days of the week tend to get more traffic, etc.. This well help you round out your optimal blogging schedule.
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