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6 Blogging Mistakes Your Business Should Avoid

This article is more than 10 years old.

Blogging is a critical component of business social marketing strategy. It's an owned media channel that helps establish credibility and expertise in any niche, while also providing a platform for engaging more directly with customers. Many brands have big ambitions when beginning to blog, yet end up making critical mistakes that hurt, rather than help, their brand. During the recent SMX Social Media Conference in Las Vegas, I had a chance to sit down with Mike Arnesen of SwellPath to discuss the biggest mistakes businesses make when blogging - and how to avoid them.

Posting Content When No One Is Expecting It

When you blog as a brand, it's critical that you both post frequently and on schedule. Posting sporadically can impact how well your blog ranks in search engines, but can also hurt readership numbers, as visitors may think you stopped posting and never return. Arnesen also points out that it's important to post consistently when your audience will likely read your blog posts. As he says,"If your audience is tech or social media people, promoting your content on a Saturday won't do so well," as they won't be online to read your content.

Not Planning Your Content

While it may be acceptable to post personal blog posts on a whim, strategically planning content is crucial when blogging as a part of your brand's social media strategy. Blog posts should be weaved into your overall marketing calendar, along with a strategy around who is going to write each post. Mike explains that, "A content calendar is really essential when you have a team that is driving the content you put out. The content calendar is crucial so you have the right people talking about the right content." If employees aren't sold on the idea of spending time writing blog posts, you may want to remind them that this content can demonstrate their expertise and potentially advance their own professional career.

Assuming You Know Everything

Many bloggers make the mistake of trying to create their own content, which often leads them to eventually stop blogging. Successful bloggers usually find ideas to write about, sourcing knowledge from others via platforms like Reddit, Quora or even competitors' blogs. Mike explains that it's easier - and you will be more successful - if you find out what other people want to know and what other people are currently talking about than assuming you know what your audience wants to read. (If you're especially savvy, Mike also suggests simply using Google's search function to find what people are already searching for, which can lead to content ideas.)

Not Using Google

While many people still claim that Google+ is a "ghost town," this social network is actually very important to helping your blog increase readership and potentially appear higher in search rankings. Mike explains that, "If your site is trying to get traffic from Google search - which is about 80% of your traffic - you need to embrace what they're focusing on. Google is extremely invested in Google+, as it is a direct line of social recommendation information for Google, and they want to know what people like. This is the easiest way for Google to know this." Mike advises not only sharing posts on Google+, but also using Google's authorship feature.

Not Optimizing Metadata

While SEO has definitely evolved over the past few years, it's not dead - and Mike points out that optimizing key metadata is important to help readers share and find your blog. This data, including the title tag, description and open graph image, are critical so readers can easily share your blog on social networks like Facebook. This data also helps search engines correctly index your blog posts. Metadata, according to Arnesen, "gives you control over how your content is presented. When someone shares your content, you want it shared in its best format. In search, this helps fill in your description instead of the search pulling in unrelated data like navigation," which could be really detrimental to your rankings.

Not Using Images

Finally, one common mistake many brands make when blogging is not using images. A lack of images impacts how a blog post looks when shared on social platforms. Using images also helps keep readers engaged on blog post by providing visual and psychological breaks, which are especially useful for longer posts - and who doesn't want that?