Everyone agrees that having a corporate blog at this point is pretty much a “must have”. With the revolution of social media marketing, it’s imperative to have a platform for your loyal customers to voice their opinions, a place where your brand can achieve awareness, and a place for you to inspire and lead. That can all be accomplished through your corporate blog. So, what do companies do? They go out and build their blog! Everything’s great, right? Well…not exactly. What companies fail to realize is that while your blog can be a huge asset, that’s only if your blog is implemented correctly. Make a wrong turn, and your blog can actually be killing your sales. Here are 5 ways your blog may be sabotaging your business as we speak.

1. Your Blog Is Your Home Page – A lot of companies think this is a great idea, but they couldn’t be further from the truth. Businesses think, “Well, my blog is the most interactive page, and it gets updated the most. That’s where I’ll send my visitors because they’ll have fresh content that they’ll love!” or, if they’re thinking along the lines of SEO (Search Engine Optimization), they’re probably thinking “Bots and spiders love fresh content. I’ll get a higher page rank if I make my blog my home page, since I’ll be updating that page all the time!”. Let’s address the first issue, shall we? Your visitor is literally just a browser at this point. They’ve discovered they want to search for something, they pull up their favorite search engine, enter in their keywords, and find your site. So far, so good. Then, they click on your site about “air mattresses” and find a blog that they now have to search through to find the content that they need. Really, your visitor was looking for a simplified site that allows them the ability to find out who you are and what you have to offer in the span of 5-8 seconds. With blogs, they’re bombarded with information overload, and hit the back button quicker than you can believe. Now, for the second issue…if you’re looking to please only bots/spiders, I hope they pay well…a page with high page rank and no conversions is a useless page.
2. Your Blog Is Disconnected From Your Main Site – What’s the point in having a blog if it can’t be found? For that matter, what’s the point in having a blog, if you can’t get to your website from it? See the dilemma? While you may have the best intentions, and a riveting blog, the navigation path has to be written out in crayon. I’m a visitor, and I want to know how to get from your blog to your home site and back to your blog. Tell me!
3. Your Blog Is Your Business – When people initially begin blogging, they underestimate the time and dedication it takes to be effective. You can’t simply write a blog post whenever you feel like it, or you’ll lose traction. So, you come up with a schedule that makes sense, and allows you to continue to release fresh content routinely. Once you do that, though, it’s easy to become wrapped up in it. On a day where you’re not supposed to write a post, you find yourself perusing for hot topics to write about, writing your next blog post in your head, searching for graphics for your next post, and heck, probably even writing the post. The point is, your blog should only make up a percentage of your total marketing efforts, and it certainly won’t bring in all the leads. Don’t lose focus and forget your other marketing campaigns.
4. You Don’t Follow Through – On the flip side, there are those who begin blogging, see how much work is involved, and flicker out like a candle. It can be overwhelming, but the last thing you want to do is give up altogether. Your blog will stay online, and your pages will still be indexed. If a consumer goes to your blog page and sees you haven’t written a post in a few months, they’ll think you don’t care about the general public, aren’t interactive, and can’t commit to your efforts. Are we taking a big chance in assuming all this? Yes, but remember, the online browser is fickle, and there are a million other websites out there that can offer the same thing, so it’s important you make a good first impression in the few seconds you have, or that back button’s getting clicked!
5. You Don’t Play Well With Others – If you can’t be social, don’t bother. Blogging requires a certain amount of political public relations. Sometimes you’ll just have to bite down, put on a grin, and interact. If you turn out to be completely rude and alienate your potential clientele, you’ve now branded your company online with a bad attitude (which is hard to get rid of) and completely turned off your customers.