6 Blog Post Ideas Featuring Your Business

Give your business a face and connect with your audience more fully by showcasing your people, customers and offerings with images, video and the stories and opinions of the people involved.

Try your hand at the post types below and, when it makes sense, link directly to pages on your business website or online store to give readers more information:

1) Product or Service Spotlight
Provide greater insight about your offerings with more in-depth information or by showing them in action.

Try these:

• Meet the product/Explore the service – Take a close look at one product or service that has a great story or offers more than customers may realize.
• Before and after – Convey the difference your product can make for your customers by including a before and after post with pictures.
• Recommended uses – List excellent tried-and-true or creative new ways to use your products or services.
• Comparison – Take two or more similar items in your business and compare their specific uses, specs, benefits and value.

Examples:

• General contractor – Bathroom remodel, before and after, with photos and a little about the fixtures and materials
• Clothing store – 6 fabulous ways to wear your shop’s line of Sashay sashes
• Personal trainer – 5 surprising benefits of stretching

2) Customer Cameo
Enhance your blog’s authenticity by featuring your clients and customers. Not only will you add human interest, but you’ll also make featured individuals feel special and appreciated. Always keep a camera on hand if you work face to face with people, and make sure to ask for permission before posting any pictures or information about anyone.

Try these:

• Customer of the day/week/etc. – Appreciate one of your customers on a regular basis with a fun photo and quote, a tidbit or two about them, why they’re your customer, and such.
• Customer review – Give a customer the opportunity to review a product/service. Encourage them to recommend ways to use your offerings.
• Customer case study – Tell the story about a customer using your products/services and about the results.
• Customer testimonial or story – Capture a customer telling their own story about why and how they’ve used one of your offerings and the results. Or, let them recount a bigger entertaining or otherwise compelling anecdote, featuring but not focusing on your product or service.

Examples:

• General contractor – A client telling about how quickly and professionally you rebuilt half of their house after a kitchen fire, accompanied by “before” photos and “after” photos with the client’s family
• Clothing store – Spotlight on a regular customer including his style tastes, his favorite lines in your shop, and a photo of him wearing a shirt and jeans you carry
• Personal trainer – Brief interview with a client about the weight loss regimen you put them on, along with before and after photos

Tip:
Consider offering a discount – for instance, 10% off next purchase – to a client or customer who participates.

3) About Us
Most business websites include an “about us” section, but your blog offers the opportunity to give your audience a more personal, in-depth or timely view of you and your business.

Try these:

• Meet the owner – Tell a little about yourself and your relevant background, why you started/love your business, what related challenges you’ve overcome, why you chose your location, etc.
• Meet the team – Introduce your team as a whole, or focus on a star employee or on staff with backgrounds or interests that will intrigue your audience.
• How we do/make X – Give insights about what goes into your offerings that makes them special – what your business does and the way you do it.
• Day in the life – Provide a closer look at what you or any of your employees do in a day/week/year, and what makes it unique.

Examples:

• General contractor – An up-close look at your special snow-proof leak-free method of laying a tile roof.
• Clothing store – Spotlight on Melissa, your salesperson with a black belt in Kung Fu and a mod sense of style, with a link to a video of her sparring and pictures showing her dressed impeccably in clothes from your store.
• Personal trainer – The story of your competitive bodybuilding career and how that informs the way you work with your clients.

Tip:
Make your business more personable by including lots of pictures.

4) Supplier/Vendor Spotlight
Acquaint your clients with your suppliers or vendors and how they make your offerings possible. Avoid going into as much detail as in an About Us post, unless directly relevant to the products or services that you offer.

Try these:

• Meet the company – Highlight a supplier’s story, people, place of business and principles.
• How a supplier makes X – Describe their processes, inputs and what’s special about the way they work.
• About their products/services – Present their products as a group, calling out anything distinctive such as ingredients or processes.

Examples:

• Clothing store – Designer of the month, featuring an introduction to Anita Sachs, her inspirations, her line and how the clothes are made by hand, along with photos and links to her products on your online store
• General contractor – Introduction to the fresco-painting subcontractor you regularly use, including a description of their Old World methods and photos of their work on their contractor website
• Personal trainer – Interview with the owner of the gym where you prefer to work with your clients

5) Our Favorites, Top Sellers

Try these:

• Top sellers – Tell readers about the products or services your customers purchase most often, either overall or within a certain category.
• Our favorites – List products or services that are a hit among you or your employees.
• Customer favorites – Describe the products or services you get the best feedback and repeat business from.

Examples:

• General contractor – Why you love taking your customers solar, in terms of the job itself and the benefits to the customer.
• Clothing store – Your 6 top-selling jeans for men.
• Personal trainer – The 3 ab-blasting exercises that have brought your clients the best results with client quotes

6) What’s New
Keep your clients up to speed on whatever they might like to know about you and your business. While this may mean occasionally sharing personal updates, be sure to keep them brief and stick to the important news.

Try these:

• Special announcements – Inform customers about seasonal arrivals, deals and promotions, longer/shorter hours of operation, closure for vacation or an upcoming customer-appreciation event for them to attend.
• News about the business – Share the latest about your business in greater depth, for instance, reporting on a new location, employee, certification or type of product or service.
• Personal updates – Let customers know briefly about something important that has happened in your life or to one of your employees.

Examples:

• General contractor – An article about LEED green building certification and how you are now credentialed to certify any qualifying business structure
• Clothing store – Fall arrivals announcement with photos and an open invitation to a wine-and-cheese event to celebrate
• Personal trainer – A quick update to share the happy news about your new marriage and honeymoon, with photos

Tip:
If you’d like to share the personal news of your employees, first make sure you have their OK.

It can be a real challenge not only to keep your blog stocked with fresh posts, but also to form a connection with your target audience. These suggestions are meant to help you do both. Have you given any of them a try? If so, which worked best for you? Do you have any to add? We’d love to hear from you!