Over two decades ago, blogs entered the world as an online diary, then evolved into a weblog, and eventually gained momentum into the powerhouse lead generation tool they are today. While their purpose has remained constant, blogs have obviously evolved in many ways. Today, running a blog is a common full-time career, a place where people can expand their knowledge, seek advice, and read reviews before making a purchase. 

Making up 85% of online shoppers, millennials (individuals born between 1981-1996) have been the focus of B2C marketing for years. As the largest generation in today’s workforce, this generation is grabbing the attention of B2B marketers. After all, millennials are growing up and moving from post-college jobs into decision-making, management, and even ownership positions. With this information in mind, it’s important to understand how this generation differs, what they value most, and which factors play a role in their purchasing and decision-making habits.

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Brands who prioritize blogging efforts are 13x more likely to see positive ROI, and 55% of brands say blog content creation is their top inbound marketing priority, according to Hubspot data.

However, having a blog on your website doesn't guarantee ROI. Too often we see businesses and brands start without a blog strategy. They're full of energy and they start producing numerous blog posts filled with fresh ideas. The first 45 days are exciting as the content is flowing but between day 45 and 60, page views start to taper, and even though the numbers look good, visitors aren’t turning into customers.

Creating consistent quality content is one of the biggest challenges marketers face. However, “You don’t have to create content day in and day out. You just have to work on getting the content you already have in the hands of more people,” according to a post written by Derek Halpern, founder of Social Triggers, on why bloggers fail.

Repurposing content allows you to reach different audiences through a new format, improve your organic visibility, and reinforce the authoritative content that you already worked so hard to create. If you need ideas on how to repurpose content, check out the infographic below.

Many people out there think they are blogging. Are they just blogging to blog? Or are they strategically blogging to get results and drive the efforts closer to success?

When it comes to blogging, you may be wondering, "What makes the perfect blog post?" In my opinion, this is both an art and a science. It needs to be visually appealing with text breaks, a good amount of white space, and visual elements. But it also needs to be written in a way that provides value, engages the readers, and encourages them to take a specific action.

In other words, writing a good blog post is no easy feat. Understanding the basic building blocks of the perfect blog post is a great start.

A few times a year, we have a company-wide step challenge to see who can get the most steps in to foster some friendly competition and some good health. In fact, I just got back from a quick walk on my lunch break to see if I could squeeze in a few steps for today.

Before I left, I had a call with a prospect who was expressing some frustration they're having in trying to get their sales team to contribute to their blog. They know their sales team has some great ideas and great thought leadership and subject matter expertise, but they just can't get them to share.

I hear a lot of people in marketing and business development that tell me that they "blog." But I want to know what they are doing with their blog... are they getting results from their blog or just wasting time to say they "blog" with no proof of success? Do they even know? Or... do they even want to know?

When creating content for your company blog, you’ve likely asked the dreaded question: What do we write about next? You may feel as if you’ve run out of post ideas or you’re writing about the same topic over and over. Regardless of your content dilemma, there are a few sources that you can use to extract new blog post ideas.

It’s important to note that when using these sources, however, the ideas aren’t always obvious and may not jump out at you instantly. Rather, this method requires you to dedicate time to collect information, analyze it, and brainstorm topics based on your findings. While this may take some time initially, it’s more than worth the investment. Not only will you have a list of new blog post ideas, but you’ll have the tools you need to create blog content that is relevant to your target audience - and their needs and interests - and that will most likely drive engagement and increase conversions.

Consider the following sources to help you generate more post ideas for your company blog:

Salespeople can be great sources of blog content. They engage with prospects and the market everyday. They're hearing questions and overcoming objections, and their responses to these questions and objections are great content for blog articles because this is what your prospects want to know, read, and learn.

THE CHALLENGE: How do you get your salespeople to get the info out of their heads and into the blog? How do you get your salespeople sit down and write?

Your blog is a digital hub for the valuable, educational, and entertaining content you create for your target persona. Its goal is to increase awareness, drive traffic to your site, generate leads, and establish authority – leading to profitable customer action.  

But running a successful blog is a challenge for some businesses, and it requires constant analysis to ensure your current content strategy is effective. This can be done by reviewing the content you’ve created, assessing what worked or didn’t work, and creating a plan of action to improve going forward. Or in other words, conducting a blog audit.  

This process can help you uncover what content resonates most with your ideal prospects, and in turn, guide your content strategy and increase your awareness, engagement, and even conversions. It gives you a high-level view of how well your blog is (or isn’t) performing, and identifies gaps and opportunities in your blog strategy.  

The good news: it’s not as complicated as it sounds. And if you’re wondering where to start, what to evaluate or how to apply your findings, we’ve created a simple system to help you evaluate your own blog and begin seeing real results from your content.