5 Ideas for Creating Blog Content for Your Manufacturing Company

So, you launched a blog as a marketing initiative and now you have to actually fill it up with content. What a daunting task, right?! You’ve already got enough on your plate dealing with the day-to-day tasks that come along with the job. Adding what might seem like hours on end to write content is just not going to happen…

Well, fear not! We’ve got 5 tips that will make content creation seem like a walk in the park.

1. Check your Contact Us form submissions

If you don’t have a Contact Us form on your website, you should! Go check out the comments section of that form. Odds are – you’ve already got a start to a number of different topics to cover. Answer each question in a separate blog post.

2. Utilize someone else’s content

We’re not talking plagiarizing here, but think of all the industry related content you read on a daily basis. Did you read an article recently that really spoke to you? Write a response post to that article on why you agree with what the author is saying. Conversely, have you read an article where you disagree? Play the devil’s advocate and do a response on why you think differently. Bonus tip: Link back to the article and tag them in social media posts!

3. Article round-up

A round-up article is basically a list of a bunch of different articles from various sites. For each article, you can write your own quick review of it. For example, you can write a post about 6 steel suppliers worth checking out. Link out to each site, and write a quick review of their product. You can also do a round-up of different articles you’ve read all relating to a similar topic. Bonus tip: this round-up type article is a bonus for SEO since we are linking out to multiple related articles.

4. Interviews

Interviewing can help tremendously with gathering together great content. Here are a few different types of interviews you can conduct:

• Interview an industry partner
• Interview an employee
• Interview a customer – after all, these are your brand evangelists!
• Interview yourself - sounds crazy, but as you’re driving into work or to and from meetings, you’ve probably got a lot on your mind. Record voice memo’s of yourself while it’s fresh in your mind, then sit down to write when you have time, or send the memo to an employee who can transcribe the audio into an article for you.

5. Involve Others

If you are taking the lead on content creation for your manufacturing company, you don’t have to do it alone! My co-worker Nadine wrote an article on how multiple blog voices breed readership success. Getting others involved, from your CEO to shop floor employees, will help the ultimate success of your blog. You might be thinking…. Easier said than done, our VP of Operations wants nothing to do with this “blogging bologna.” We’ve heard that one before, so here are some tips to get past this:

• Incentivize! What better way to get people involved than to incentivize them to write. Depending on what your company is willing to do, here are some ideas:
  • For every 10 posts you write, you get to start your weekend early and take a Friday afternoon off
  • For every 100 visits your post gets, you get $10. Now, this not only incentivizes employees to write, but also to share their blog post all over their social media channels.
  • Whatever you decide to do, try to make it a fun, friendly competition!
• Show Results! Send out a monthly or quarterly company-wide email sharing the results of the top 3 posts for that time period. Not only is this a nice pat on the back to those making the top 3, but it will help to show employees what types of content are performing best, based on the topic or type of content (list, review, video, etc.), so they can better plan for their next post. That VP of Ops might be thinking differently if he can confirm that 10 leads came in on a “silly post” he wrote. Helping everyone to understand the impact content creation has on the business is key!
• Make it Mandatory! Have an internal quarterback who is in charge of pulling the teams’ content together. Give that quarterback the authority to reprimand people who are not pulling their weight on the blog.  Last but not least, set up a public calendar in advance and stick to it.
  
  

By following these simple tips, you’ll be on your way to stellar content creation for your blog. As your blog grows, so will your brand awareness, lead generation, Internet presence and your team will be viewed as a group of thought leaders who are experts in your industry.