Humor Can Be a Hot Potato in Blogging for Business

“It’s no surprise that using humor in advertising is an effective way to connect with your audience and humanize your brand or company,” observes Jason Miller of Social Media Examiner. “Just because your company is serious doesn’t mean all marketing has to be,” he adds.

As a corporate blogging trainer, I must admit I was relieved to see that Miller added an important caveat: “Being funny is a risk…Some people might not appreciate your company’s brand of humor!”  Bill Faeth, writing in the Inbound Marketing Blog, agrees. The reason comedies are typically outnumbered by dramas, he explains, is that being funny enough to make hundreds of people laugh without offending anyone is actually really tough. You can poke fun at yourself, Faeth suggests. Almost anything else, especially competitors or where they live – probably a no-no.

On the other hand, (one of the functions of a business blog, I have taught business owners and professional practitioners IS to offer different aspects of an issue before explaining why they are on one side or the other of that issue), Hope Hatfield of LocalDirective.com  points out that humor is a hook, having the same impact as a strong headline to grab the audience’s attention. Humor’s an icebreaker, she adds, but only so long as you carefully consider your target market, focusing the humor around a problem your company can solve.

No matter how funny your marketing messages are, don’t forget that the goal is to educate your prospects about your products and services. “You want to make sure that you don’t lose the message in the humor, Hatfield cautions.

Research at the Saimaa University of Applied Sciences on the impact of humor in advertising on consumer purchase decisions concluded that, while humor is an effective method of attracting attention to advertisements, it does not offer an advantage over non humor at increasing persuasion.

So what do I think the bottom line is for using humor in blogging for business? Well,…barring politics (including company, city, state, national, and international), religion, ethnic groups, physical appearance, food preferences, insider information, and anything anyone might conceive as risque – go right ahead.  But keep the humor centered around your own weaknesses and around the consumers’ problem you’re offering to solve.