how often?

You might have noticed that I haven't posted since last week. I've been busy working on two client projects, which is great, hurray business! But, as the little voice in my marketing head started to speak louder and louder, "go post on the blog already", I decided I better get on it and write about frequency.

If you do a Google search on the topic you'll get dozens of answers, many of them on, you guessed it, blogs. You'll also find a variety of opinions on how often a person should blog. And, ironically, when it comes to advice on the Internet, I always take it with a grain of salt.

So, to be effective, how often should a small business owner post to their blog? The simple answer: how often works for you?

Let me put it this way, if your time is best spent creating your product or out selling it or doing the books or any other task your core business needs you for, sitting down and writing a blog post probably won't be time best spent. I won't tell you that you need to write a post or two a day, because that isn't good for your business in the big picture. But, as you work throughout the day, you can be thinking about what you will write when you do write next. Maybe something will happen during your day that inspires a great entry. Really interesting, insightful, and useful posts are what appeal to your readers most, anyway.

So rather than giving a strict schedule of posting, here are some points to guide you:

On Message: Before you blog, think about your marketing objectives and make sure every posts helps work toward those goals.

Interesting: As I mentioned, if your posts are useful, insightful, funny, entertaining, or any combination of these, people will check your site for updates.

Brief: You don't have to write a novel each post. Streamline your copy, use bullets, short paragraphs, make the copy easy to scan.

Topical: Make sure your posts reflect what is going on right now. Print out a calendar and write down post topics that correspond ahead of time. Relate your posts to current events. Stay relevant.

Useful: Provide links to related information that you find helpful. Write a sentence or two about why you are providing the links and why you think your audience will get something out of them too.

Valuable: If it goes with your marketing strategy, use your blog to provide discounts, deals, and special offers.

Connected: Are you using other social media to support your blog? Frequent activity on a micro-blogging site or a quick one liner of Facebook can go along way to keep you in peoples' minds.

Conversational: Actively involve your audience in the conversation. Ask them questions, give them an opportunity to talk about themselves, their opinions and needs. Follow up with posts that involve their input to keep the conversation rolling.

Good luck and good writing. Now I have to get back to that client work!

Look for our next post: Gazelles and Lions (really this time, it's a good story.)