Every Friday, we’ll offer some of our thoughts on content marketing, curate a few interesting articles we’ve come across (from the marketing and legal industries and otherwise), and tell you what we’ve been up to.

This week, a client asked me whether people read blogs anymore.

The answer is yes and no. (Unsatisfying, right?)

Blogging isn’t dead–and it’s not even close. There are more than 76.5 million blogs on WordPress alone. More and more businesses are recognizing the value of content marketing: in fact, according to HubSpot, 55% of marketers say that blogging is their top content priority. Content marketing gets three times as many leads as paid search advertising (Content Marketing Institute). And websites with blogs tend to have 434% more indexed pages (TechClient).

Then why do people think blogging is so “2000 and late”? Because so many people do it wrong that it can be hard to find bloggers doing it right.

People remember when they read a poorly drafted blog full of grammatical errors and typos. They remember blogs in hard-to-comprehend, broken English cobbled together by spinning software. They remember copycat blogs that say the same thing as every other blog.

People are looking for good content to read, but sometimes good content is hard to find.

So, what makes good blog content? In a nutshell, here’s what good content looks like:

It’s not promotional. The goal of a blog should be to educate, not to sell.
It adds value. It goes in depth enough that it provides useful information, encouraging website visitors to keep reading.
It shows personality. People feel more connected to authors who share a bit about themselves through their writing.
It’s visually appealing. The post has images and is formatted for easy reading online, avoiding huge blocks of text.

We’re curious. How many of you read blogs? Why do you read them? Drop us a comment or line and let us know!

Looking for some (more) tips to improve your content marketing?

The Ultimate List of Marketing Statistics for 2018 (HubSpot)
9 Stats That Will Make You Want to Invest in Content Marketing (Content Marketing Institute)
The 2019 Ultimate Guide to Facebook Engagement (Buzzsumo)

What’s new this week in the legal industry?

Need something to talk about after you break your resolutions?

What is glitter? (New York Times)
Why isn’t there better WiFi on trains and buses? (Washington Post)
What’s up with the typos? (Washington Post)

So, what has Scribe been up to this week?

Making New Year’s resolutions for our business
Writing about best practices for early case assessment
Drafting articles on the key developments in the ediscovery industry over the last year
Forecasting what will happen in the legal tech industry in 2019
Looking for new writers to join our team (drop us a line!)

Ready to kick off the New Year with fresh content? Let’s talk about how we can help you put together a strategy.

Friday scribbles: do people still read blogs?