When Is it OK to Have a Ghost Blogger?

A common dilemma: You run a business, your employees are super-busy selling, developing product, managing the office, etc. And you’re being told (truthfully) that if you want to compete successfully on the Internet, you need content, content and more content. But where, when and how are you going to do that?? Help!…

Is outsourcing your online content creation an OK approach? Yup, if you can afford it. (And please focus on quality, not just dollars; for example, offshoring can be uber-cheap and the results the same.) At the very least, you should pay someone to do research, writing and linking for your corporate blog and/or online articles.

At one time, the concept of “ghost” blogging - having someone else write with the CEO/VP’s name on it as the blog author - was considered something of a no-no as it pertains to transparency and all.

However, the push towards content on the web has gotten more and more intense - having become a fundamental requirement of successful Search Engine Optimization (SEO). You literally cannot get on Page 1 in organic Google search results today without having original, regularly added content.

Executives are not in their jobs because they can write well and quickly, as well as find suitable links, images and know how to optimize them all for search!

That’s where the “ghost” writer/blogger comes in. If transparency is key to your business (and why not) then consider using the approach of the CENTURY 21 Canada blog, which disclaimed that posts in its national blog that show the president and CEO as the author, were “supported by” another person. OK, not full disclosure, but close to it.

Your disclosure that someone is helping your blog authors (VP, Director, etc.) write their posts does not take away from the value of that original, fresh content going up on your site. Not for Google, nor likely to readers.

If you need the help, strive to find a ghost blogger who is not only a gifted, trained writer, but also understands how to SEO. And, if you require a second person, you should look for someone to create and optimize content specifically for other social media (besides your blog) - Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ and other sites relevant to your business. If you can get it all in one supplier, all the better.