Does your company have a blog, and is it regularly updated? If not, you could really be missing out on a simple and easy way to build trust and credibility with your client base. Companies that have a good blog get more leads, and more leads can translate into more sales.

If your company has a blog, though, and it’s not doing much for your bottom line, it could be because you need a blog manager. The way your blog is handled can have a big effect on its success over the long term.

Did you know? Here at Real Authority Media, we offer customized blog management solutions for all of our client’s needs. If you are interested in discussing a strategy for how we can help boost your sales with blog marketing, contact us to set up a free consultation.

Here’s what to consider.

What Does a Blog Manager Do?

You may not have heard of a blog manager before. After all, don’t people just write blogs and publish them? Why do they need someone to manage that?

But the truth is that many companies don’t have a consistent schedule or plan for blogging. They may blog for a few weeks, and then get busy with other things or forget about it for months at a time. If something exciting is going on in the company, they may blog more often. At other times, they don’t know what to say.

It’s very important for someone to be in charge, so they can oversee the process and keep it on track. A blog manager does all of that, from coordinating with guest bloggers, to finding topics and establishing a schedule.

You could delegate those duties to someone who’s already in your company, but that may not be the best option. It adds more stress to that person’s working life, and if they aren’t sure about the role it may not provide any benefit for your company, either. It’s best to hire an outside professional.

The Meaning of a Blog Manager

The meaning, or definition, of a blog manager is, essentially, a person who manages a blog. But when you hire someone to do that for your company, there will be a number of areas that person will be taking on.

Unlike an individual who manages their own personal blog about life, a hobby, or a special interest area, managing a company blog takes a significant amount of coordination with others in order to make sure everything is operating smoothly. Without collaboration, it’s easy to overlook the details.

Not only do blog managers handle the day-to-day operation of running the blog, but they also create consistency. Determining who will write the articles, what those articles will be about, and what schedule they will be published on are all part of the duties of a blog manager.

Finding an audience and getting the blog posts in front of that audience is part of the job, too, as is determining whether the blogging is working or whether it needs to be adjusted in order to be as successful as possible for the company.

Typical Blog Manager Duties

The typical blog manager has duties and responsibilities to consider on a daily basis. In order to have a successful blog for your company, you need a blog manager who understands what will really resonate with the intended audience for the posts. That audience should be largely made up of your prospects, as one of the main goals of a company blog is to bring in more clients or customers.

As prospects move into and through the buyer journey, it’s important to help them feel valued and understood.

One of the things a blog manager has to focus on to help with this is content strategy. If the content the company is investing in isn’t creating leads and sales, it may not be the right content. That also means it may not be a good investment and may need to be adjusted.

Without a quality, knowledgeable blog manager, though, your company may not catch this problem in a timely manner, or know what to do in order to solve it. Some of the main duties of a blog manager include:

• Leading brainstorming sessions at your company, in order to find the most timely and important blogging topics to bring in more prospects.
• Developing a strong content strategy that prioritizes blogging topics and make sure the most important ones are handled first.
• Managing a calendar for blogging, to be sure the company’s blog stays on schedule and updated regularly, throughout the year.
• Hiring writers (either on staff or in a freelance capacity) and then managing those writers, their workloads, and the topics they’re covering.
• Facilitating the coordinated efforts between the writers for the blog and the internal contributors at the company, such as salespeople, managers, and others.
• Training and teaching any internal contributors to the blog, such as those who want to add their voices but who aren’t hired on as writers.
• Locating and managing any guest bloggers who are a part of the process, or who are asked to contribute to the company’s blog on a specific subject.
• Analyzing all the results of the blogging, such as whether it brings in more prospects, and which posts are seeing the highest return on investment.
• Ensuring that every blog post follows best practices for blogging, such as:
  • SEO (search engine optimization for better ranking)
  • Readability (proper grade level and word choices)
  • Graphics (video and pictures, as well as graphs or charts)
  • Format (layout on computer and mobile devices)
  • Calls to Action (asking prospects to call, email, or stop in)
  • Hyperlinks (to other company articles, and approved outside sources)
  • Proofreading (to catch simple typos and other small issues)

That’s a lot for one person to handle, and if you don’t choose the right blog manager, you might find that they aren’t handling it in a way that really works for your company. But you also don’t have to choose a random person who says they have experience in this area, either.

You have choices when you hire blog managers, and you may want to consider selecting a blog management company, instead of hiring just one individual. Before deciding, take a careful look at the differences between the two options.

Blog Manager vs. Blog Management Company

Hiring a blog manager means you’re getting a single person to handle everything listed above. Sure, there are probably people who can do that. Some of whether they’ll do it effectively depends on the size of your company, how big of a project your blog is, and other factors. But you also have to take into account that one person may struggle to do the work that could be done by a company.

If you hire a blog management company, you get a higher level of support, from more people who know how to help.

A blog management company can often be a better fit for your company’s blog management needs. Instead of working with one person who has one specific skill set, you’ll be working with a company that has your company’s best interests in mind. That way, you get the best of the skillsets and ideas the management company has.

If one person is weaker in certain areas, you have others who are stronger in those areas. As a whole, the entire blog management company operates at a higher level that way.

When you work with a blog management company that operates at a high level, your company’s blog will also be at a high level. That’s not to say a single blog manager can’t provide quality. But only that a group effort is often more valuable and sustainable.

By hiring a blog management company, you also don’t need to go through the work of trying to find a blog manager, because the company will handle that for you. Hiring a management company for your blog could be the best thing you’ll ever do for prospects.

A Typical Blog Manager Salary vs. the Cost Of Hiring a Company

Another question you’ll need to ask when it comes to hiring a blog manager or working with a company, is can you afford it? Perhaps the better question, though, is can you afford not to?

Especially if your competitors are blogging, or your prospects expect to see a blog from companies in your field or niche, you don’t want to be the company that’s not doing what’s expected of it. Sometimes, being a rebel can have value. In this case, though, it will be more likely to cause harm to your bottom line.

The average salary for a blog manager in 2021 is around $48,500. That can be a significant amount for your company to payout, especially if you’re a smaller operation or just getting established.

It may also be a difficult investment if money is tight, or you’re struggling to bring in more prospects. While it often takes spending some money to make more money, you may find that hiring a blog manager at that cost isn’t going to help your company get to where it wants to be in the long run.

On the flip side of that, a blog management company may cost you as little as a few hundred dollars per month, all the way up to thousands. You can pick and choose the kinds of services you need more specifically with a company, as well, which can mean paying for only what you really need at the moment and scaling up over time.

If that’s a more comfortable approach for your company from a financial standpoint, a blog management company may be a much better option for your needs.

The Blog Manager Skill Set

Whether you hire an individual blog manager or choose a blog management company to help your company bring in more prospects, the specific manager who’s helping you should have the skills they need to improve your company’s blogging abilities and bottom line.

Good writing skills are key, but they aren’t the only things needed. After all, the manager may not be writing that many of the blogs. They may be hiring writers to do that, and those writers will need to be skilled.

Blog managers should also have skills in SEO, project management, and blogging best practices, so they can keep your company’s blog on track, and make sure you don’t get penalized by the search engines. An eye for details such as graphic design and imagery, and the ability to analyze data strategically and draw conclusions from it, are also skills that a blog manager needs.

You want to get as much help for your company as possible, and a blog manager with the right skills can be a huge asset for you in that area.

However, there’s one skill that is absolutely the most important for any blog manager or blog management company you hire to have. The person or people managing your company’s blog must thoroughly and completely understand your sales process, inside and out. If they aren’t able to look at what’s needed from the perspective of the end-user, they likely aren’t going to be able to help your company blog effectively and make needed changes that will resonate with your target market and prospects.

When blog managers understand what your company is really offering, and the value it can bring to its customers, they can think strategically and put themselves into your customers’ shoes. Then they can use their knowledge, coupled with that perspective, to blog effectively for your company and help it continue to move forward.

The level of success your company sees isn’t completely tied to your blog, but you may be surprised how much of a positive difference a good blog management company can make.

Ready to get started, on taking your company to the next level?

Looking to bring in new prospects, and convert them to long-term, loyal customers?

Starting and managing a blog is the way to do that. Here at Real Authority Media, we can help customize a blog management solution that will boost your overall bottom line. Our clients trust and rely on us to post fresh SEO Content to their Blogs every week! Contact Us to find out more!