Our clients and prospects continue to ask about blogging.  Should we blog? How do we blog? What would we blog about?  How will it benefit us and our members?    I’ll get into more detail below, but first let me say “YES,” chambers should blog. 

1.    Communication that engages your members.   Just a few years ago, we were saying “every chamber needs a website.”  Now it’s “every chamber needs blog.”   Your current members are becoming more tech savvy every day.  And, the young professionals you hope to attract as members are already using new methods of communicating.  To stay relevant to your audience and to expand your influence moving forward, you need to engage them with media in which they can also participate.  Instead of “talking at them,” make them a part of the conversation with blogs and other social media.  Yes, that does mean you lose a bit of control, but in the long run you have more meaningful conversations and engage your audience. 

2.    Positioning you as an expert.   You shouldn’t just be following the business trends; you should be helping to create them.  By blogging about relevant business issues, you can strengthen your position as an expert and the voice of business for your community.  By “breaking” news on your blog or by providing frequent updates, your chamber can be viewed as an insider, a news generator and an organization that has influence.  Businesses will recognize that your chamber is an organization they should be aligned with (and hopefully a member of) if they want to stay connected to local business community.

3.     More immediate delivery.  Blogs make it very easy for you to publish content in an instant.  Your print and even email newsletters have such a lead time that information may be outdated before it reaches your members.   You can blog from the city council meeting, state legislature, your own events or anywhere to create a sense of urgency to your communications.   Your blog can become the portal to your chamber, make your chamber easier to find and provide a reason to visit your site more often. (Or even subscribe to your feed).   

4.    Your members are blogging, you should too.   Many of your members already have blogs for their businesses or they are commenting on other business blogs in your community.   You need to join the conversation and tell your story!  And, you can become a good case study for your small business members who aren’t yet blogging. It can be a powerful demonstration when you’ve actually used the tools you suggest to your members.

5.    Focus on member benefits.  Yes, all of your communications should do this, but blogging keeps your chamber focused on what is important to your members (and prospects). It forces you talk to their benefit instead of talking about your chamber.  Blogs allow you to easily create lots of content, giving you many chances to demonstrate the benefits of your organization.  Talk about your government affairs efforts, specific benefit programs, events, economic development items, etc., but always demonstrate how these items can benefit (or protect) your members.  Weave in posts about exclusive benefits, too, so that non-members learn why they should join your chamber.

Several of our clients are blogging with good results, including the Boston Chamber of Commerce,  Eugene Chamber of Commerce and the Maryland Chamber of Commerce, who I’ve mentioned before.

Check out these chamber blogs and see how they are using blogging technology to engage their members, help to improve retention and even generate new member sales.  I’ll have more posts soon about specific blog post topics for chamber, too.