How to Start a Business Blog, Part 2

This is part 2 of a new series on how to start a business blog, and is aimed at businesses of all sizes. In these articles, I’m going to address business-specific concerns and requirements for business blogging.

Step 3: Determine the Purpose of Your Business Blog

One way in which business blogs are unlike personal blogs is that they’re not… well, personal. They need to fulfill a business purpose. Or, if you turn it around to face the customer: a business blog should meet customer needs. A business has a purpose beyond just earning money. Earning money is the result of a business fulfilling its greater purpose. A business blog helps the business fulfill its purpose. Hammering out the purpose of a business blog is one of the most important early steps in the process of starting a business blog.

To help you choose a direction, I’ve listed some non-mutually exclusive overarching goals a business blog can strive towards:

• Convey company news and events.
• Demonstrate knowledge, expertise, passion, and authority in a niche or industry.
• Provide helpful tips and info on getting the most from company services or products.
• Pass along success stories from customers about how your business has helped them become more successful.
• Dominate a niche or industry in search results (hence market and mind share) by becoming the authoritative source for information on a subject and using good SEO.
• Become a resource for the media and cottage industry about your business’ market, elevating your business’ position and brand.

When I speak of a business blog, I’m not specifying any size of business. I will in future articles, where necessary, because there are some things a large company should do differently than a small one. What I’ve written above could just as easily apply to a business of one (like a MicroISV) as to a Fortune 500 company.

The points above can be combined in any way: all of them or some of them can be the goals of a business blog. The first one alone would make me and everyone else yawn as we reached for the back button. They aren’t exhaustive, either; I’m sure others could add to the list.