In case you haven’t heard, blogging is important for businesses today.
Companies of all kinds are looking to implement blogging strategies.
Part of developing that strategy means hiring people to write blog posts.
You can usually find some great information for blog posts within your company, but it’s more difficult to find internal bloggers. You might find one. If you do then you’re one of the lucky ones.
I used to work for a large ecommerce company with hundreds of employees. It was difficult to find people interested in blogging. Even in a small business it’s difficult. The owner might be interested in blogging, but they’re usually pretty busy and will find that they don’t have time for it.
So it comes down to hiring a blogger, but since this position is relatively new to most business it’s difficult to know what to look for.
Well in this post I’m going to share a few of the secrets we use at Ghost Blog Writers to find our expert team of writers.
I’m really proud of the people we have on our team. They do great work and I think we’re continuing to improve the process we use to build that team.
Top Blogger Characteristics
The top characteristics we look for include:
- Punctual
- Inquisitive
- Persistent
- Self-Disciplined
- Reliable
Now let’s dig into each one a little bit.
Punctual
This is the biggest one for me.
Other things you can teach people to do, but it’s difficult to teach someone to be on time. I don’t even know if it’s possible. The blogging world is based on deadlines. You have to be able to produce quality work on a consistent basis. There is no room for procrastination.
At GBW, we like to give new writers a vague deadline such as “Tuesday”. We’ll then see when the writer submits the blog post. There is a difference between the ones that turn it in first thing in the morning (or the day before) and the ones that turn it in at 11:59 PM the day it’s due.
Inquisitive
This is one you might not think of for a blogger, but we find that if a person is inquisitive about life in general that they’ll be good at finding information. When you have a natural curiosity about life you’re going to figure out how to get information.
That information is necessary to create good blog posts. You have to look everywhere to get the material you need. People that are curious make good bloggers.
We usually ask what people are interested in and from their early drafts we can see if they’re willing to dig a little deeper to get things like stats, stories and other information that turns a good post into a great post.
Persistent
This one is unique to business owners it seems. They never give up when they’re struggling with something. They fight until they find a way to get the task completed. I think that’s a pretty unique trait.
Bloggers that care about what they’re doing will do whatever it takes to complete a blog. This ties in well with being punctual. Even if you’re going beyond your allotted time on something it’s important to keep going until it’s ready.
Blogging doesn’t take the same amount of time each post. Some will be a breeze and others will require some more in depth research. A persistent person is better equipped to handle the fluctuation.
Self-Discipline
Another big one for anyone that’s successful including bloggers. They need to be able to meet deadlines. And they also need to be able to be critical of themselves.
We find that’s it’s necessary for our writers to be able to proof their own material. It cuts down on the internal processing of proofing by having writers that can discipline themselves while they write. If they get lazy the clients know it and our writers will usually be quick to figure it out on their own. They make things better.
That’s a good trait to have in a person on your team for anything including from a blogger.
Reliable
This one always makes me think of professional sports. You hear coaches talk about players all the time. I like when they talk about the blue collar or lunch pale players.
These are the guys that aren’t flashy. They simply show up every day and do what they do. They’re consistent. They’re always there. You don’t have to worry about them.
Coaches love this kind of player and business owners love this kind of employee. You don’t have to worry. You don’t have to worry about fluctuations in performance.
A blogger that is reliable is hugely important because things happen. Some people just seem to have a knack for avoiding catastrophe in life. These are the ones you want on your team.
Resumes Are Meaningless
It’s the truth. We don’t use any kind of resume at GBW. If someone sends me one I don’t even look at it.
We have a “what can you do for me” attitude. It might seem candid, but we only care about the kind of writing you can do now and in the future. You don’t have to be perfect today, but if you can show some promise you’ll have a good chance of making the team.
The best resumes today are case studies. We need case studies to show our potential clients.
Writers that have their own blogs that are up-to-date should be held in high regard. If they’re doing it on their own for nothing you can bet that they’ll do it for you for some money in return.
Final Thoughts
We have great writers on our team at GBW. I’m really proud of them.
We’ve had some that haven’t worked out. That’s going to happen, but over time I think we’ve done a good job of getting some great people on the team.
The characteristics above are the things I would tell others to look for when hiring a blogger.
Finding these traits in people has helped us build a great team at GBW.
They should help you build yours.
Image: Angelo DeSantis