Small business owners ask this all the time – “do I really need a blog? That just sounds like a lot of extra work. I doubt our customers will even read a blog if I wrote one. So why should I start a blog for my business?”
There are many benefits of adding a business blog to your website. Let’s dive right in… Here are three reasons YOU should start a blog:
1. Fresh Content – drive traffic to your site
Think about your business website. It probably has a home page, about us page, contact page, maybe a few pages for specialty products or services… How often do you update your website? Once you get the content finalized and your website published, chances are your don’t think about it again unless your business grows or your products and services change.
If your website never changes, customers have no reason to visit your website. A regular blog gives your current customers and readers a reason to check back in periodically for the latest news and answers to their questions.
Beyond that, if your website doesn’t change, Google has no reason to visit your website! Fresh and changing content is an important factor for your website’s organic search performance. Every blog you post is another page on your website, which gives search engines more content to index and evaluate.
The new content also lets Google, Yahoo, Bing, and other search engines know that your website is active, and they should come back regularly to check for new updates. Search engines want to provide the most up-to-date information to their users – your fresh blog content gives the search engines a reason to come back, and gives your business more opportunities to show up in search results!
Bottom line – more content, more traffic to your website.
2. Establish Authority – show potential customers you’re an expert
Another great reasons to start and keep a blog is establishing authority. In marketing, authority means demonstrating expertise on a topic or subject. This helps you to establish your brand and build trust among your customers and community. Publishing valuable, informative content on industry related subjects will show your readers that you are an expert in your field. Great blogs answer questions that your customers have – they can search for their question, find the answer in your company blog, view you as their trusted expert and come back to YOU the next time they have a question.
Authority also impacts SEO for your website. Search engines want to provide the most accurate, relevant information to users – though it’s not clear how the algorithms measure it (social reference, engagement, links) there is little doubt that they do assess authority.
When your blogs share valuable, expert information about the subject, it helps the search engine “bots” to recognize your expertise and authority in that area. When search engines learn that your site is a leader in your industry, they will rank it higher than your competitors, non-expert website. This will, in turn, help more people to find your website when they search that subject, increasing your authority again!
3. Build Community – integrate with Social media
Every blog post is another opportunity to provide new, fresh, original content to your social media networks. You can promote your new blog post on social media to generate more traffic to that post and your website. Your blog archive also provides a great library to reference into the future. Need an idea for a Tweet or Facebook post? Scroll through your archive and share an old blog!
With every blog, you can facilitate conversation with your audience. Social media engagement lets you communicate directly with your customers about every post. Many blog platforms like WordPress, Tumblr, and Blogger have comment features built right in, or you can add a plug-in like Disqus to facilitate discussion.
Engagement can also help you to learn what subjects your customers are most interested in. The blog posts that generate the most online discussion, comments, likes, retweets, shares should be replicated. You can learn directly from your customers what they are interested in, what they want to know, and how you can better serve them.
Ready to start a blog?
Blogging is an easy and effective way to make your website work for you! Ramp up your SEO, build a community, and establish authority as an industry expert with blog posts. For more information on getting your website to work for you, or to get started with a new blog for your business, call us at 303-703-8000 or click HERE to get in touch with our digital marketing experts!
