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For bloggers who blog for their company, their business, their product, it’s important to remember that just because you have a level of status within the business community, it’s not an excuse for dry content and limited interactions. Actually, being a company online is more of an opportunity, and it seems more and more are taking advantage of what social media can offer.

So with no excuse not to be online and interacting with your customers and supporters, what do you do?

Blogging is a key starting stage where you, the company, and begin to share ideas that involve the community, at the very least keep them informed with what’s going on.

1. Best Practices
Sound boring? It can be. I think this all depends on what you’re sharing. All successful companies have a key practice that they adhere to in order to keep customer satisfaction at an all time high. It could be how you deal with customers, or perhaps an internal process that keeps the company happy and motivated to work with and for you. This provides great insight into the company culture for people that are big supporters of what you do, and they in turn can spread the word, most likely causing other companies to replicate your model.

2. Productivity Tips
A great idea if you’re in the consulting or customer service industry. Sharing ways to streamline processes, tips to use software or processes to make work easier and more efficient are all good ideas to share with your readers. Not only to you show competency in your field, you also educate others that might be struggling with an issue.

3. White Paper
If you or your company is doing analytical research, or writing reports that can benefit the industry as a whole, this “white paper” can be seen as another feather in the company’s hat of expertise. Sharing this information on the net for others to read establishes your professionalism, as well as the business as an industry leader of forward thinkers and idea developers.

4. Answer Customer Questions
What better way to take customer questions and gripes than on the net. Many feel this transparency can be scary from a business perspective, but the community sees it as a ” ‘fessing up” of sorts. You don’t necessarily have to take only the complaints to the net, but establishing a process by which you communicate with readers in an open forum provides you a reputation of being fair and open.

5. Start A Series
Take the customer feedback you get, and turn it into a categorized series of posts. Perhaps you’ll do 1 whole week on a certain topic, and the following week it will change to another highly sought after topic. This is a great way to “dangle the carrot” to your readers to keep them coming back for the next installment of shared information.

6. Share Your PowerPoint
If you’ve done a lot of speaking engagements, you’ve probably had to use PowerPoint a lot as a tool to help convey your message. A lot of people may not have been able to make your presentation, so the next best thing is to share the high points of your topic by sharing your PowerPoint. Perhaps a brief description would be nice, but this keeps the community involved on what you are sharing when you do public speaking engagements.

7. Conduct Interviews
Interviews are great, and can benefit both sides of the conversation. On one side you could interviews of higher ups within the company to keep their faces recognizable and make it appear to your readers that upper management is reachable and open for discussion. On the other hand, you can interview supporters on the streets, or via online video outlets like Seesmic or Qik. This is a great way to add a differently dynamic to your blog.

8. Look for Trends
Keeping on top of the hottest topics in your industry is a must. Using Twitter, competitor’s blogs, and tools like Google Alerts, you can stay on top of what the readers want to know most about. Integrate these topics into your site as they relate to your business and readers will find you timely, effective, and on the mark.

9. Test A Pitch
Who better then to provide feedback on a new marketing campaign, or direction for the company then your readers, your loyal followers. By sharing your intent, you’ve opened yourself up to the truest of community action forms that exist in social media. Warning: not all interaction will be positive, but learn to work with the negativity and be suave with your responses.

10. Pictures/Updates of Honors & Special Events
Who said the blog had to be all business. If you’ve done something outstanding, share it with the community. We’re all human, we’re not a corporate suit, that’s not why you came onto the social communities, you came to connect with people. As long as everything is in good taste, there is no problem with sharing the good times with your readers and showing the fun times that can be involved with being a part of your company.

As a business, it’s important to diversify, but also keep your readership entertained, informed, and engaged. Try a few of these topics out on your site, and as you see your community grow have fun, otherwise why are you online to begin with?

Photo Credit ntr23, Terren in Virginia, Wenzday01