Chiropractic association blog is painlessly effective
The Canadian Chiropractic Association (CCA) has one of my favourite websites. I like it because it’s simple yet stylish, well laid-out with large feature images and buttons, the text is easy to read and the drop-down menus are well arranged. And, the site has a comprehensive and regularly updated blog that reaches out to potential clients and offers a solution to their problems.
The blog page of the Canadian Chiropractic Association
The CCA is responsible for giving chiropractic care a good name in Canada and advocating for its member practitioners. They know that one of the most effective ways to accomplish this is to educate people about the value of chiropractic care and offer a convincing case for its inclusion in every Canadian’s healthcare regimen. Point in case is their November 12, 2014 post – The Future of Canadian Healthcare: A Chiropractor on Your Health Care Team.
The CCA know they are in the business of selling, by teaching and influencing people. The things is, they are not in the business of selling in the traditional sense. They are advocates. They are successfully advocating because they ‘get it.’ They realize the infinite importance of relating quality in-depth information in the most modern way: blogging.
Some other companies are doing the same, by offering an information-packed and regularly updated business blog. But unfortunately the overwhelming majority are not.
Can you find the company blog? I’ll bet not
Many large, well-known and highly profitable corporations don’t have a blog. I can come up with an endless list of examples. It’s easy. I simply Google the name of any major corporation. If they have a blog, there should be a button on their website’s navigation bar that clearly says “Blog.” It will typically sit beside other buttons that say “About Us,” “Contact Us,” “Products and Services,” “What’s New” and so on.
If a viewer has to search longer than 15-20 seconds to find a company’s blog, this means it’s hidden and they will lose interest. If they’re not coming to it from some other place (i.e. a social media posting) they may not come at all. And, if there’s no “Blog” label in the navigation bar and the viewer is not on the home page, they have no link to the blog. No company wants this problem – that I call “information pain” – because it’s such an easy problem to solve.
The Polaris Transportation Group has a cool blog
The transportation company has a wonderful website, with a great blog. But they don’t advertise their blog in their navigation bar. You have to look down the page to the bottom right, where it’s clearly labelled.
The blog makes for interesting reading. I especially like the series “Our people move freight. These are their stories.” This series of articles offers us, the viewer, a personalized account of a Polaris worker.
I’m certainly not picking on Polaris. Like I said, their site is fantastic, and their blog is just as good, although it could use a regular updating. Rather, I’m picking on their competitors. I did a Google search of “transport companies in Canada” and looked at the websites of 12 top-listed companies. Some of the sites are visually stunning but as far as I could find, with the requisite 15-20 second search, only Polaris has a blog.
Why I sought out transportation companies, and what I found instead
I chose the industry on a whim, really; a whim with reasoning behind it. The business of transporting goods is rife with immense safety and insurance regulations and concerns, and I wanted to see if any company blogged about these issues. What I found instead was a heartwarming Polaris story of a truck driver who was outsourced and lost his wife, and wanted to take his life in a new direction. The man said he needed time to think “and driving seemed like a good way to do it.”
This is proof that the use of emotion and narrative can be effective in your blog. It works well in this case because we get to thinking about the stereotype of the long-distance trucker with a lot on his mind and the road ahead that will help him soothe his soul.
It’s not information, per se, but it is interesting. It accomplishes two of blogging’s main objectives: building a community of like-minded people, and engaging customers. Increased business can’t be far behind, because who wouldn’t want to do business with a company that values its workers enough to share their stories?
I can help
Blogging for business is one of my specialties. I especially like showing the human side of business. If I can help your company with your blogging needs and wants, contact me and we’ll discuss how to turn your blog into an living breathing ultra-human entity. If you haven’t begun blogging yet, don’t worry because you’re in good company. We can talk about that first.