Why is Blog Writing Important for Growing Your Business?
I hear from a lot of small business owners who ask me, “Who reads blogs anymore? No one is coming to my website to read my blog.” Others cringe at the thought of writing or push it to the side, prioritizing other marketing efforts with ‘a bigger ROI’.
If you can relate, then this series on Blog Writing for Small Business Growth was designed just for you!
There’s a lot of misunderstanding out there as to what a blog really is and how powerful of a tool it can be as you’re growing your business.
You may know deep down that you should be blogging but still linger on the sidelines. Or, you may only have a blog on your website because the firm who built your site put it there.
Wherever you are in the process of marketing your small business, a blog is a strategic marketing and sales tool that can help your business grow.
In this series, I’ll show you how to develop a blog for your business and use it to get in front of prospects and customers. First though, let’s talk about why a blog can be such an effective marketing tool.
What is a Blog? And, Why Does Blog Writing Matter?
These are two very big questions! I could spend ALL day answering them and getting into the nerdy weeds about the beauty of blog writing. But, let’s start by keeping things simple. Here are the basics.
A blog is a space on your website to post articles, information updates, tips, and other content that you need and want to communicate to your customers. It’s a tool that lets you dive deeper into a topic than you can on a standard page of your website.
Essentially, it’s a hub for much of the content you use to communicate with customers and prospects.
Here’s why that’s critical.
You Have to Guide Your Customers to Where You Want Them to Go
For most of us, the interim goal of a digital marketing strategy is to get people to our website to take a desired action. This could be to download an e-book or fill out a contact us form. For most e-commerce businesses, the end goal is for the visitor to hit that ‘Buy Now’ button.
Assuming your goal is to get potential customers to your website, you can use your blog as a means of doing so. Once your blog is loaded with great content, it gives you the power to do several things to help get customers and prospects to your website so you can make the sale.
Here’s how.
Two Big Ways Blog Writing Gets the Right People to Your Website
Your Blog Gives Your Site’s SEO Keyword Strategy a Place to Live and Grow - Helping You Capture Organic Search Traffic
Over time, you’ll see your organic web traffic tick up and up if you’re taking your well-written, highly valuable blog content and optimizing it with the right keywords in the right places.
Placing the right keywords in the right areas of your blog says to Google, “Hey! I have the information that searcher is looking for!” Optimized content gets Google’s attention and proves that your blog post deserves to rank high on the search engine results page for a particular keyword topic.
In the past year or so, Google has put a priority on content that matches the searcher’s intent along with phrase matching. This has made answering your prospect’s questions and helping them find a solution to their problem even more critical in the constant battle for organic search rank.
2. Each Post Provides You with a Landing Page for Social Media, Video, Newsletters, and Any Campaign You’re Running
Your social media channels and other external content are tools that can help you create awareness for your brand and drive people to your website. A blog gives you a place to send them that’s relevant to the specific information they’re after.
For example, if you’re a health coach and you throw up a social post about the amount of water each of us should drink per day to stay healthy, that social post could click through to a blog post that goes into detail about the amount of water needed, tips for getting more water into your day…AND…a ‘Sign Up Now’ button to get your visitors registered for your upcoming health coaching session.
Look out for a lot more on leveraging blog content across social media to drive conversions later on in this blog series…
The Biggest Reason to Start Blog Writing for Your Business
Here it is - the most important reason you should have a blog on your website. To Help the People You’re in Business to Serve.
Do this, and you’ll not only help your customers, but you’ll help your bottom line as well.
That’s because businesses who lead understand that they’re in business to serve others, not themselves. By packing your blog with content that can help your customers reach a goal or find a solution to a problem that your business is designed to solve, you’re not only serving them – you’re building relationships and creating loyal customers.
You can uncover the best keywords for driving the most relevant traffic to your blog, but if your blog articles serve no purpose and don’t help the people you’re in business to serve, you’re wasting your time.
You can pump ad dollars into Facebook ads or PPC (pay per click) all day long, but if your content falls flat – and doesn’t provide a prospect with the answer they’re looking for – you’ve lost them.
You won’t fool Google and you won’t trick your audience. Poorly written content serves no one – including you and your business.
Time to Start Blogging
When your website includes an active blog with killer content – and when that content incorporates a smart SEO keyword strategy, is used across your communications channels, and gives your customer a solution to a problem you’re in business to solve – your blog will become one of your biggest sales engines and help you grow your business.
I’ll have lots more blog content of my own coming soon to help you create strong content that supports your audience and drives traffic to your website.
If you have specific questions about your blog content or are looking for a little writing support, contact me and let’s chat. I’ll help you write killer content so you can serve your customers and find success in your business.
Looking for Help With Your Blog Content?