Joining The 500 Club
Well, this is it. Blog post #500. We started blogging in October 2009. No need to do the math, it’s just under three-and-a-half years. It started slowly at first, but for the most part I’ve been blogging four days a week during most of that stretch.
Yesterday, I promised some insights on what I’ve learned about content marketing during that time. Today, I’ll focus on my motivation for starting and how it has changed.
Most people get into content marketing with a similar mindset. We’ll provide helpful content, over time people will get to know and trust us and that process will eventually lead to added business.
T60’s Motivation for blogging
Yeah… that wasn’t me. While I knew all that going in, none of that really factored into my motivation. For me, it was all about SEO.
Three years ago, I looked at the T60 website and knew it needed a change. I had built it myself, and while I think it looked fine, it needed a professional’s touch and above all else it needed a lot of SEO help.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have the cash to upgrade, but once I had enough to move forward I wanted to be ready.
Knowing that the number of pages at a site and frequency of updates factors in to SEO, I thought I’d start writing a blog. I’ve always been a writer, so why not?
Here I am 500 posts later, and the new T60 site is a week or two from going live. We’ll roll the blog into it, so I’m hoping all the hard work will pay off.
Who’s going to read this?
What’s interesting though is the blog has provided me with so much more.
One of the main reasons I wasn’t really into the typical motivation behind content media is that I honestly didn’t know how much interest there would be in my subject matter. Who the heck is going to read a daily blog on video production!?
Well, the simple answer to that is at least 275 people. That’s the current number of followers we have. Not a huge number by any means, but it’s more than I thought we’d have. We don’t get a ton of comments, but we do get a fair share of “likes” everyday. That’s a nice feeling, but it’s only part of our new motivation.
Now… it’s about ‘cred. Being a consistent blogger has given me/T60 added credibility, and it’s starting to pay-off. I know that’s a big reason why a lot of people get into content marketing, but it has slowly grown on me and I’m here to say it works… only I’ve found it in a different way.
clients love it
I don’t know how much online ‘cred I have, but T60’s clients always seem impressed by the blog. Over the 500 posts, I’ve blogged about a lot of FAQs we get from prospects, so one of the things we now do is occasionally work the blog into our proposals.
For example, if a prospect asks me a question about storytelling, I follow it up with a proposal that includes links to blog posts on that subject… and they eat it up! Not only do they appreciate the actual information, they’re impressed by my commitment to blogging.
Anyway, I’m here to tell you… content marketing works. It isn’t a quick strategy. I’m three-and-a-half years in and it’s just now starting to pay-off, but I’m glad I got into it.
–Tony Gnau