It’s been referred to as the heart of inbound marketing (Salesforce) – we are speaking of, (of course) the humble blog.
There are a number of benefits that come from establishing and committing to regularly posting news and articles onto your website. In this post we look at the top five reasons to get a business blog up and running, and start posting!
1. Improve Search Rankings
It’s no secret amongst web marketers that adding new and fresh content to your website is great for SEO. That’s why you’ll see so many digital agencies push for a content marketing strategy. Starting a blog holds definite value for your website, as each post is a new page addition to your website (Google likes sites that build content and grow). The trick is to go the next step, and apply ‘on-page’ SEO principals to each post. That means using select keywords both in the post and behind the post in the title tags and images etc. This will help your post get found, driving increased traffic.
2. A broadcast station of your very own
How often do you get an opportunity to generate free, unedited publicity for your brand? Having a company blog means you write the content – your words, written your way. You should think through what you would like the market to know about your business. Develop a plan on the topics and how often you think you can develop appropriate posts. For instance you may align the content to the key areas of your business, you might share your opinion on industry issues or talk about how you have solved the business problem for your client.
3. Create shareable content
A blog that creates and posts useful and interesting content will be liked by other blogs and can be shared across social media. There are two real benefits to you when this happens.
Firstly, you’ve created something that will promote itself via links and references on other blogs (essentially selling itself), and secondly, writing a great post on your blog provides excellent content to share across all of your other social media avenues including Facebook, Twitter and even LinkedIn.
Take a look at our own blog on all things marketing related – see what we do here?
4. Be the expert
It’s worth investing time to produce high quality and informative content that will be of service to your audience. A great way to determine what to write about is to think about some of the most asked or misunderstood elements of your organisation. For example: If you’re a NFP, some doners may have hesitation towards donation wondering how their funds will be spent. A series of posts on ‘How your money is helping’ that share some of the social/economic problems experienced and story sharing about how these conditions are improved can help alieviate doubt and increase understanding and brand/cause connection. In the same way being a business expert, or thought leader in your chosen field can go a long way to building trust and confidence.
5. Attract higher visits & improve sales
At the end of the day attracting visitors is what it’s all about. Writing really great content will eventually attract a prospect with an issue that you have indicated you can solve. Post frequently, captivate your audience and see posts shared far and wide will encourage a prospect to respond. People may come across your blog post via an organic Google search on your selected topic, or they may click through from a social media page where the post is included. It doesn’t matter how they get there…getting them there is the goal. The more hits on your site and the more time spent reading content that ultimately places you as someone who’s opinion is valued.
There is nothing to lose, and much to gain from blogging about your business. You might like to take your time and start with one post a month, as you get comfortable with the process. But one thing is for sure – blogging is the birthplace for content marketing, and content marketing has been at the forefront of digital trends for the past few years.
Want more advice on where to start with your business blog? Get in touch with us at Make it Happen. We’re bloggers too!