Blogging for business is becoming more and more popular. According to a recent study, small businesses that blogged consistently received 126% greater lead growth than those that did not. With numbers like that, can your business really afford to ignore the popularity of blogging? If you still think it can, here are a few reasons why your business should be blogging.
Search engine optimization and inbound marketing.
These two things alone should be enough to convince you that blogging is essential. Each time you create a blog post related to your industry, you can use keywords that will increase your company’s search engine optimization (SEO). Greater SEO translates into more potential customers finding your business online. This is where inbound marketing comes in. When people do a Google search for things your company is writing about, they are more likely to become a customer. This customer found you without you spending any money on direct marketing. How nice is that?
It gives your company a voice.
Conventional forms of marketing such as television and radio ads severely limit what your company can say to customers. Even social media limits this by only allowing you to post a certain number of characters at a time. Also, people on social media don’t spend a lot of time reading long posts. When people visit your blog, you already have their attention.
Maintaining a blog also gives you a chance to prove your company is an expert in your industry. By sharing your knowledge via blogging, customers will get a great feel for what makes your company different from others. For example, if someone was trying to figure out why their car was making a screeching noise when stopping, they will go a Google search to try and figure it out before taking it to a mechanic. If your auto shop has blogged about that topic, your blog will appear in the search results. The person will click on the link to your blog and then may eventually figure out they need to take it to a professional to get it fixed. Who do you think they are more likely to trust with their car? A company that wrote a blog entry about this specific problem and how to fix it, or another company that didn’t? The company that wrote the blog, because the customer knows this company is knowledgeable about the issue. The same is true of blogging within other industries. Blogging gives you an advantage over your competitors.
Blogging also opens up a dialogue with customers and other industry experts. In order to keep the conversation going, encourage people to comment on your posts and respond to all of the comments you receive.
Blogging can encourage learning.
When writing a new post, it is likely that you will do at least a little bit of research beforehand, just to make sure you are up-to-date on the topic at hand. Even if you’re an expert in your industry, a little research is a good idea. This will help ensure that you stay current on things going on within your industry. For example, if your company is a marketing company and you are writing about how Pinterest can be used as a marketing tool for business (like we did here), while researching the topic you may find a few features of the site that you didn’t know about previously. No one knows everything, even in their own industry.
It can be fun!
Not only is writing a blog a great way to find new customers, it’s also an excellent creative outlet. Writing can break up the daily routine and help you get your creative juices flowing!
The bottom line here is blogging is important. If your business doesn’t have the time or resources to blog on a consistent basis, you may want to consider hiring an outside firm. Blue Frog has proven success with managing our clients' social media. Check out our latest social media case study!
