What We’ve Learned By Helping Companies Create Blogging Teams

September 17, 2015 / in Blogging / by Jason Terry

Team Many of you know that we help companies tell their stories through blogging (and social media updates and email newsletters.) We started doing this back in 2009 before anybody had really heard much about it… before it was “cool”.

We knew early on that sharing stories with trusted relationships strengthens your brand, keeps you top of mind and helps you grow your bottom line. We’ve experienced it personally and love helping our clients experience that same rush.

2015 is the year of mainstream company blogging.

We’ve had more opportunities this year than ever before and we see more and more companies (finally) sharing their stories through blogging. Some people are acting like its common sense to do blogging as part of their sales and marketing efforts. We don’t have to explain the concept nearly as much as we used to.

As companies mature in their efforts to tell their stories, the natural progression would be to create a blogging team. There are lots of good reasons to do this. You get perspectives from different areas of your organization. It’s a team building activity. It’s a great way to share the burden of creating useful, interesting content on a weekly basis. It fosters better internal communication. And the list goes on and on…

Here are a just a few of the things we’ve learned helping companies form their blogging teams:

Start small, but be open to the fact that the team could eventually incorporate anyone in your organization. A smaller team will have a better chance of figuring out your voice and learning the ropes of blogging.
It sounds obvious, but take the time to carefully pick the people that get to be involved. Don’t choose based on the fact that they have extra time on their hands. If you allow their names and faces to go along with the blog posts, they will be true representatives of your company and your brand.
Start with Why We Are Doing This, not What We Are Going To Do. Get everyone on the same page about the goals you are trying to accomplish. The people you are trying to reach. The kinds of things you want to talk about. We’ve seen companies tell their staff that they are going to write blog posts without getting initial buy-in. It doesn’t work long term. Getting everyone on the same page and coming up with the plan together will really help during execution.
Hold them accountable. The first couple of months are easy because there are so many stories to tell. As the months go by, you will see people make excuses for why their blog post didn’t get written even though they had an entire month to get it done. Either they are committed to the process or they aren’t.
Don’t keep it a secret. One of our most successful blogging clients sends a staff-wide email with the blogs that will be going out. You want everyone in the company to see what’s going on. It’s hard to quantify how giving the employees a voice helps company cultures thrive.

Does your company have a blogging team? Would you like to hear more from Mic and I on this topic in the form of real world stories? Let me know!