Sarah Ellis, marketing communications specialist, Office of College Enrollment, University of Rochester 

User-generated content has become a key component of most marketing strategies. It saves time, helps create an authentic voice, and highlights the ambassadors who eagerly celebrate your brand.

Hosting a blog is a great way to create a space for these voices and allow prospective customers to experience your brand in a new way. When they get tired of hearing what you have to say about yourself, they can read what others think. And studies show people are more likely to trust peer recommendations over an official advertisement.

But a blog isn’t a “set-it-and-forget-it” kind of thing. While it does save you time on the content creation side, it adds a whole new element: content management. So how do you handle all that blog content effectively?

1. Collect the right content.
   

• Start a focus group. Focus groups are a great way to ascertain what topics and types of content your intended audience wants to see. Never assume you know the answer to this question.
• Once you know what types of posts need to be written, you need to find your writers. If you already have regular bloggers, give them clear expectations for what they should write about and how often.
• If you’re just looking for unsolicited user-generated content to add to your blog, listen on social media for cheerleaders who are shouting your brand’s praises from the rooftops.
• This step is a never-ending process and should be in line with your brand strategy.

2. Create an editorial calendar.

• Create a monthly, at-a-glance view of what you’re pushing out through your blog.
• Schedule posts to align with the larger campaigns and goals of your department.
• Research to determine the best times to publish a blog post for your specific customers. For example, if you’re trying to recruit high-school-age students for your university, “after school” times like 3:00-4:00 and evenings are best.

3. Promote your content like crazy.

• Build social media promotions into your editorial calendar.
• Blast your content on all the social media channels you manage, keeping in mind that you must tailor the content to fit the features and limitations of each platform. For example, tweets must be concise while Facebook and Instagram posts have more room to breathe.
• Think about how your audience might differ from platform to platform. Are your Twitter followers a little younger than your Facebook fans? Consider this when crafting tweets and posts.
• Don’t be afraid to tweet about one topic or blog post several times. While you don’t want to spam followers on Facebook, Twitter is an ocean of voices, and you often have to speak up more than once to be heard.

4. Recycle old posts.

• Don’t forget about blog posts and content you published a year or more ago. Especially if your department/company operates cyclically, you should review content you produced one cycle ago. Chances are, there are still many relevant posts in your backlog that newer customers haven’t seen.
• This is a great option if you’re in a content creation slump or are strapped for time.
• Consider using a hashtag like #throwbackthursday or #tbt in your post—there’s no shame in digging up old content.

5. Analyze blog and social media metrics.

• The last step is to see how well your posts performed.
• Ask yourself these basic questions:
  • Did your posts reach your intended audience?
  • Were people engaged with your content through likes, shares, and comments?
  • How high or low were your retention rates?
  • How did people find your blog posts?
• Don’t worry if you don’t have a sophisticated analytics team on your side; many entities don’t. There are countless free online platforms and services that can help you on your data journey, and many blog hosting sites and social media sites have built-in analytics.
• If you skip this step, you’ll never know how to move forward—how to improve your content, how to ensure you’re staying relevant to your audience, and ultimately how to reinforce your brand.