A recent article on Inc.com about mission statements got me thinking.

If successful businesses have mission and vision statements, shouldn’t blogs have them as well?

Think about it, businesses aiming to continue to grow and improve in the future need a mission and vision. These declarations of purpose and goals are ways for employees of the business to understand where the business is going and what is expected of them to achieve the goals.

The same is true for any project including a business blog. So why not create statements to give purpose, expectations, and direction?

How to Create Blogging Mission and Vision Statements

The linked article above talks about the qualities that make for good statements. Clear, actionable goals and descriptions about what the company stands for are included in the best statements. The same is true for any statement of purpose for your blogging efforts.

With proper research, you should be able to develop expectations for your business blog. Look at others in your industry that have blogs. You can usually estimate their traffic with a few tools on the Internet. You could also try asking a few similar companies in non-competitive industries. They might be willing to share traffic, sales, and profit numbers with you as it relates to their blog.

For the most part, bloggers are usually willing to share more information that you might expect.

The best way to attack your blogging mission and vision goals is to start with profit (you can keep this at the executive level if you choose) and work backward to create goals for your writers. You should be able to create profit expectations and either share sales or traffic goals with your writers and others in your business.

Here is an example mission and vision statement for local farmer’s market association:

With its blog, The Local Farmer’s Market is committed to providing its customers with the best recipes, tips, and general information relating to locally grown foods. The writers and editors of the blog will determine the best blog post formats to ensure only quality information is published. Testing and improvement is a method for continually improvement with a focus on providing value for customers and profit for The Local Farmer’s Market.

The Local Farmer’s Market envisions having 5,000 unique visitors to the blog each month by the end of the first year. Everyone involved from managers, to editors, and the writers will all share in the success of the blog.

Simple. Purposeful. Actionable.

There could be more profit related items for the managers of the business to see, but having something for everyone to shoot for is best when it comes to ensuring the success of the blog.

Create a mission and vision statement for your blog. It will help you, customers, and the folks you work with have an understanding of the purpose of the blogging efforts, the goals, and the expectations.