How often should you post articles to your business blog?
The short answer: More is better.
HubSpot's recently released 2010 State of Inbound Marketing Report , based on a survey of 231 marketers, shows that companies that blog multiple times a day more consistently acquire customers from blogging.
The survey also shows that the rate of customer acquisition declines steadily with the rate of blog posting. 100% of respondents who blog multiple times a day have generated a customer from their blog compared to 90% of respondents who blog daily and 69% of respondents who blog two or three times a week.
Of course, these results don't mean you need to blog multiple times a day to see an impact from your blog. Blogging once or twice a week is certainly better than nothing -- and it's how most companies start.
Other key findings of the 2010 State of Inbound Marketing report:
- Inbound marketing-dominated organizations average a 60% lower cost-per-lead than outbound-dominated organizations.
- Over 40% of customers using Twitter, Linkedin, Facebook and company blogs have generated a customer from that channel.
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Inbound Marketing Blog Feed
Laura Ciocia 9:08 AM on February 25, 2010
Interesting findings. Was there any consideration made for post quality, perhaps measured by # of comments, Tweets, Diggs etc?
Mark Kilens 9:50 AM on February 25, 2010
I would love to know stats for how the prospect turned customer found the blog.
These results are not surprising when you look at the number of inbound links blogs create and the SEO impact they have on search engines.
Mark K.
jon 10:06 AM on February 25, 2010
is it better to blog in blogger or word press? which is the best place to blog?
John 11:12 AM on February 25, 2010
The survey, unfortunately does not show "that the rate of customer acquisition declines steadily with the rate of blog posting". Acquiring customers via the blog declines if you don't blog, which makes sense, but that doesn't necessarily translate to customer acquisition on the whole. Interesting post though.
Don Simkovich 11:20 AM on February 25, 2010
Does the study show results like the more narrowly targeted a blog then the more likely to generate customers? And does it matter for what size company?
Kris 12:36 PM on February 25, 2010
Interesting, but not surprising. What I think is misleading is that the Y-axis measurement is binary. Have you acquired a customer via a blog, yes / no? What it does NOT say is if there is an increase in frequency or volume of acquisition generated through increased blogging, or that customers at large PREFER to purchase from companies who blog.
Nonetheless, the message is clear - there is a definite segment of customers who prefer to buy from customers who blog.
Syed Amjad Ali 1:02 PM on February 25, 2010
I want to share one real time experience of mine. I have seen a company who post 3 - 4 blogs every week but they get HARDLY 200 hits for a blog.
The reason is the topics which they write. They don't know the target audience. They never focus on Market Research which is the most important factor for any business.
Recently I wrote a blog on same issue
Is Market Research Important for a Business?. Until you give informative or useful information to targeted audience, the blog will not yield you anything.
Hyder
http://www.winwinmantra.com
Jennifer 8:44 PM on February 26, 2010
This study among other things was mentioned in the webinar today, Vovici Blog Factory Delivers Customers that made me think of a great way to get more people in a company to help generate blog content even if they are short on time, by having team members dictate blog posts and sending the recorded audio to the marketing team or primary blog editor to either type up and polish or turn into a podcast. Getting more people involved in way that you can would be a great way to help increase the frequency of posts in company blog.
Jennifer
NCH Software Home
NCH Software Blog
Kristin Dziadul 10:14 PM on March 01, 2010
I think the reason why sales increase due to higher blogging rates is due to the frequency of messages seen. For example, if a company promotes their blogs on Twitter, and posts 3-5 a day, a potential customer will have a higher likelihood of seeing the posts, or at least seeing that they are writing blogs. This makes them seem like a thought leader, expert, and constantly researching their industry. This would make them more likely to buy instead of from a company that hardly blogs and is not as visible.