As a business owner, I find it vitally important to regularly meet with other business owners as often as is feasible. Not only is it just plain fun, but it helps me stay on top of my game, know what others are doing, and keep touch with other companies who can be mutually benefited by a relationship with Rezitech.

Today, I had a great lunch with Jonathan Pearson of Radiant Property Group at Corner Bakery Cafe in Brea. First off, I’m really excited to know Jonathan. When the housing bubble burst a few years back, he lost a significant portion of his income (he worked in the housing industry) and ended up having to short-sell his own home. Instead of letting that get the best of him, though, Jonathan is now using his own experiences to provide empathy and care to others who face similar situations. He and his team at Radiant regularly work with homeowners in North Orange County and throughout Southern California who are facing mortgage trouble. I’ve known Jonathan for a number of years, and I have no doubt that he should be the first person everyone should turn to when facing mortgage and real estate trouble.

Anyways, Jonathan and I spent a good portion of our time discussing blogging and how it can help SEO for any business, and our conversation couldn’t have come at a better time for me. Just last week, I spent several days in New Orleans with 10 other IT business CEOs from around the country, and website content was something we touched on, as well. One of my fellow CEOs in New Orleans also happens to be the very best example I know of a person who is excellent at blogging for business: Karl Palachuk. Karl and I also talked about blogging for business, and, based on my conversation today with Jonathan and last week with Karl, I’ve compiled a list of ideas to stimulate ideas for blogging:

Always Be Pimping

I have no idea where I first heard this (maybe from Chris Rue, but I’m sure he heard it from someone else like Erick Simpson or even Karl), but it’s pretty straight forward. The idea is to promote your products and services every chance you get (did you know that Rezitech can save money from your phone bill? I’m just saying pimping), and this includes in your blog. Whenever the opportunity arises (Rezitech can also provide your entire IT infrastructure with zero up-front investment!) you should mention how your company can help others.

Cross Promote

This goes along with Always Be Pimping. The idea here is to cross-reference other blogs, websites, and references anywhere possible. You’ll see above that I’ve placed hyperlinks anywhere I could. Hopefully, some of the guys I’ve linked to will link back to me at some point, and we can all help each other get more traffic.

Blog About Your Day

Jonathan is in the real estate industry. He makes money when people move into the areas that he serves, so, in many ways, he’s selling his expertise on the area. If he goes to a cool coffee shop, event, store, restaraunt, or whatever, he could jot a quick blog about it. He could mention how great it is to have lunch with Travis at Corner Bakery (ah, shucks… thanks, Jonathan), or talk about the upcoming Railroad Days in Brea (looks pretty cool if you ask me!). By sharing cool events and tidbits of info, people will know him as an authority in his area. That makes for a great real estate guy.

Blog About Your Life

Yesterday, I took the Amtrak to San Diego for an event I did with Autotask. I could write a blog entry about how great it was to sit in a train for 2 hours instead of driving. I could talk about the fact that it gave me time to sit, relax, use my laptop, and event catch a couple nods of sleep.

Brag About New Customers

Whenever Jonathan gets a new client, or saves a family from foreclosure, it would make for a great quick blog entry. Imagine how much more compelling his sales proposition will be to new prospects if they can see a list of personal stories of families that Jonathan has helped. In my case, I can blog every time we save a customer money (we recently saved a client over $500 a month on their Internet bill! Blog to follow…).

It Need Not Be Perfect

I’m a firm believer that an okay blog entry is better than none at all. My thoughts aren’t near completion on this subject, but that’s okay… this is a dialogue, not a thesis. I’ll add more to this list later, I’m sure, and when I think of more blogging ideas to share with the world, I’ll have another excuse to write a quick entry. Good stuff!

So, that’s about it for now. Bottom line — you should be blogging and using social media to promote your business. I have an appointment to make now, so I’m going to cut this off here for now, but I’ll try to finish these thoughts in the days to come.