Blogs That Keep Clients – and Their Communities – Coming Back for More

The topics of blog articles that we write for our clients are often chosen weeks or months in advance any postings. Yet each topic must remain timely and relevant once each entry is finally posted. Coming up with such topics on a regular, consistent basis and writing them in an interesting, informative way is both challenging and rewarding.

To achieve this goal, we follow a three-step process:

1. We talk with the client. We learn about the issues that are important to them as well as the primary goals for their blog. Do they need to brand their product or service, build awareness of what they do, generate leads, or do all of the above? What ideas do they have for blog topics? We use this information to develop an initial list of relevant blog topics, on which the client can rely until they are able to generate their own list.
2. We become an expert for the client. Let’s say our client for this discussion runs a dinosaur museum and has just signed us manage their social-media efforts. Not knowing every detail about dinosaurs and those who study dinosaurs, the best chance of leading our client toward their goals comes from being experts through extensive research. What new discoveries have taken place across the globe? What are today’s paleontologists saying about dinosaurs? The list goes on and on. Take the Tyrannosaurus Rex, for instance. While this dinosaur has been extinct for nearly 70 million years. discussions surrounding T. Rex are alive and well across the web. By maintaining a strong focus on research, we can become experts.  And our research will inevitably fuel excellent, thoughtful blogs for our carnivore-loving client.
3. We connect with the client’s communities. Many clients have two communities: the physical one in which they are located; and the virtual, or online, one. The online community is comprised of aficionados of the client’s product or service. By connecting the client with relevant, online thought leaders, top influencers and fans, both we and the client are able to obtain new perspectives that can help generate excellent topics for future blogs. The physical community plays a similar role by helping to make the client a trusted, valuable local resource. It does so by supplying the client with timely, relevant news and information for blogs. This can occur through local activities, events and industry conferences. For our dinosaur client, it might be The World Conference on Paleontology and Stratigraphy.

By following this three-step process, we produce blogs that satisfy our client and well-inform their communities over the long run. This keeps the the client – and their communities – coming back for more.