How To Make Your Pharma Blog More Sticky

By Rob Wright, Chief Editor, Life Science Leader
Follow Me On Twitter @RfwrightLSL

By Rob Wright

As a life science executive, you are busy. Thus, if you have committed to creating and maintaining a blog to communicate insight, you want to make sure people keep coming back, commenting, and being engaged – what we in the biz refer to as sticky. Variety, they say is the spice of life. A blog that varies its type of content is likely to keep readers and users coming back for more. Below is a list of specific types of blog posts. However, don’t feel compelled to create blog posts representing every type listed. Let balance and variety, and most importantly, reader reaction be your guide.

Useful Blog Types For The Life Science Executive
Here are 10 blog types applicable to a life science executive blogger.

1. How-To Guide: Step-by-step instructions or guidelines on how to accomplish a task or activity or reach a goal. Here are some examples from ProBlogger and Instructables.
2. Informational: These blog posts are just what you would think – an assemblage of theories and facts on a particular subject. These posts serve to inform, e.g. ReadWriteWeb.
3. Link Roundup: A blog post that contains a collection of links to other industry and topical posts. Linking to other popular sites builds credibility for your blog and sends traffic to deserving sites, for example PowerServe Blog.
4. News Analysis/Commentary: Rewriting a news piece is considered an original blog post, but might not be the best use of an executive’s time, unless you are willing to comment and share your insights on what the news means. Consider adding links to additional resources on the news article.
5. Lists: These are some of the most popular posts you can make on a blog. It’s a numbered or bulleted list of resources, information, or opinions on a particular topic.
6. Rants: Rants are, well, rants. It’s a post that can be humorous and cathartic. But, it should be personal to the author, for example, when I blogged about cell phone idiocy here or irritating business buzzwords here. These posts can be popular, however, they can also be damaging. Make sure you’re not posting anything that you’ll regret. If you wouldn’t say it to a company in person, you shouldn’t post it.
7. Reviews: If you’re in a position to review a product or service, readers will find your firsthand opinion valuable. Reviews have to be complete and authoritative to carry any weight. Also, if the product or service improves productivity or saves time and money, give the reader some metrics, productivity increased by “X” %, saved $Y or days, weeks, or months. If a new product saves time and money, without specifics you are leaving the reader open to interpretation because if the product saved a penny and a minute of time, it still falls into this category.
8. Opinions/Perspectives: These posts take a topic and add your industry expertise and authority.
9. Promotion Post: Almost everyone has something to “plug” once in a while and alerting your blog followers can be valuable. However, it should never be an excuse to overtly promote a vendor or your product. Any promo must have real value to your readers/users. Here’s an example of a promotional post Seth’s Blog.
10. Award/Recognition Post: These posts highlight what the writer considers to be the best of some category. The post has two purposes: first, it provides value, and second, it builds inbound connections with companies/people being listed. You might build a solid following to your pharma executive blog if a vendor knows there is a monthly vendor of the month blog, or an employee of the month announcement.

Many life science executives shy away from giving an opinion as a result of an overly conservative legal department. The result is a boring and uninformative blog. Develop a disclaimer statement, mix up the types, and share your opinions.