A decade or more ago, the blog was largely a confessional platform for people to share their thoughts and ideas on a personal level. For some they were an electronic alternative to the handwritten diary. It didn’t take long, however, for businesses to see the possibilities for blogging.
Get one of these for your keyboard, and you’re all set!
But it’s a mistake to think that having a successful blog only requires you to jot down a few thoughts each day. For one thing, people expect more from blogs than they used to. For another, building and maintaining a blog following is a bigger task than many businesses realize. The web is littered with carcasses of abandoned blogs, most of which fade into obscurity.
Bottom line: if you’re going to have a blog, you need to make a long-term commitment. The blog may be a relatively new medium, but the endlessly flowing stream of content is something that people have grown to crave, whether they want to learn what life is like in a foreign country or find out when next season’s boots will become available.
What’s Necessary if You Want to Handle Your Blog In-House
The technical aspects of adding a blog to your website are usually easy to cope with. It’s content creation that trips up most new bloggers. Your existing SEO plan can help you with things like promising keywords to build blog posts around, and depending on your business, the calendar can sometimes provide ideas (like if you have an e-commerce business that depends heavily on Christmas shoppers).
SEO is the premium oil that keeps the engine of your blog performing consistently.
You have to set aside time for writing and proofreading blog posts. It may seem like something you can fit into a few minutes of downtime here and there, but it really isn’t. If you personally don’t have time in your schedule to blog, is there someone on your staff who has the time and is capable of the task?
Creating an editorial calendar is indispensable for business blogging, because it helps you take control of your time. Another trick that can help is to stockpile all those half-written drafts, because you never know when you might want to come back and finish one or two when you’re low on ideas. Finally, you should take notes frequently, in all situations. Maybe that means carrying around a small notebook and pen, or making voice recordings on your phone. These can be invaluable sources of ideas and you will forget most of them if you don’t document them.
Outsourcing Your Blogging
Many businesses choose to outsource blogging, a market that has matured considerably over the past decade. There are many ways you can do this. You could, for example, have a freelancer write blog posts and send them to you so you can post them as needed. You could hire someone to write a library of “evergreen” posts that can be consistent traffic magnets for blogs. You can also hire individuals and companies to take care of every aspect of blogging, from generating ideas to suggesting keywords, to posting and promoting content for you.
Which Companies Can Benefit Most from Outsourcing?
Small and medium sized business can benefit tremendously from outsourcing, even if they can’t afford end-to-end outsourced blogging services. These companies are usually the most pressed for time and the least likely to be able to hire someone expressly for blogging and social media management. Whatever level of service a small or medium sized business may need, it’s available, and at a range of price points. Naturally, the first step to successfully outsourcing your blog is research.
The Range of Services and Costs for Outsourcing Blogging
Before you go looking for freelancers or blog writing services, define as precisely as you can what you want your provider to deliver. For example, you may want five, 500-word blog posts on the Electronic Control Modules in European sports cars, delivered to you in Word files every Friday. Maybe you want someone to submit ten blog post ideas, of which you’ll select seven for them to write and deliver back to you. If you want someone to provide end-to-end blogging, write down all the steps this entails, including keyword or other SEO research, idea generation, content making, posting, and promotion.
You can find services at just about any price, but with outsourced blog posts you get what you pay for. You can’t pay a dollar per blog post and expect flawless grammar and shapely, enthralling sentences. At the same time, don’t let someone convince you that you have to pay some outrageous price for 500 words on organic kale. For something worthy of your blog, depending on post length and which additional services you want, expect to pay anywhere from around $30 to $120 per post. At these prices, it’s reasonable to expect the posts to have been handled by an editor and to be publication-ready.
Your search for a blog writing service can take you across the globe.
In-House or Outsourced: Keys to Blogging Success
Whether you choose to handle blogging in-house or to outsource, one of the most important things you can do to ensure success is to articulate your long- and short-term goals. Do you want to drive more sales? If so, how much do you reasonably want sales to increase, and on what time scale? Are you trying to build a particular brand image? Ask and answer all relevant questions.
Blogging is a long-term proposition. It’s fun to start a blog, but the fun factor drops off fairly quickly. The good news is, as a blog gains loyal readership, the fun comes back even stronger. Eventually, with a great editorial calendar, outstanding ideas, strong SEO, and high-quality content, blogging can become like a well-tended machine, running efficiently and making you proud. But blogging is never a “set it and forget it” project.
If you’re thinking about outsourcing to a blog writing service, you can try ours for free. Our team of writers and editors delivers outstanding content, and the services that make sure your target audience sees it. C’mon. You know you want to.