In today’s world, having a website is essential for a business to make money. Every ever so small business is represented online, from small shops to giant companies. Looking at company websites, we can also see another development: Almost every company has a blog. But is that really necessary? Is a blog essential for a company’s success and if so, how and why? These are questions that I want to answer today.
Blogging is a powerful way to promote your online business but there are still companies out there that are hesitant to jump into the blogging world. For good reasons! It takes a lot of time and commitment to build a successful blog. The first few months or even years will be hard. Unless you have a lot of writers who can come up with great content, you will most likely not see the results you were hoping for very soon. However, if your company is committed to make it work and pulls through the first discouraging months, there are a lot of benefits waiting on the other side of the river.
Here are five major reasons, why your company should start blogging today.
Top 5 Reasons for having a Company Blog
There are certainly a lot of reasons for starting a company blog. Here I want to focus on what I think are the five most important reasons to get started writing one. But as I said, there are a lot more reasons why it might be beneficial employ a blog writer.
#1 Blogging drives traffic to your website
How do you sell a product that nobody knows about? Exactly: You don’t sell it at all. So in order to sell it, you first need people to know about it and therefore you have to have people on your website who see your product. But: If nobody knows about you, how do you expect them to land on your website?
That’s where blogging comes into play, because believe it or not: Users don’t usually go online for the sole purpose of buying what companies are selling. They go online because they need some sort of information. They are interested in certain topics and want to know more about them. Once they got all the information they need, they decide where to buy from. However, companies still throw out money by trying to target customers with online advertising when they could have just given free information to attract new customers.
So instead of spending your money on advertisement, you should put your efforts into optimizing your blog content. Pick highly-effective keywords that are relevant to your business and naturally integrate them throughout your posts. This strategy needs time and there is much more to it than identifying keywords and writing several posts using them. However, this is not the post to go deeper into that topic. If you want to know more about SEO, I highly recommend looking at the post Blogging for SEO by HubSpot.
#2 Every post is a possibility for another lead
With traffic coming on your blog posts through Google, with each blog post you now have the possibility to convert that traffic into another lead. This is very simple, all you have to do is adding a great call-to-action that customers will want to click on.
These call-to-action buttons don’t necessarily have to lead to a product. In fact, a lot of the times they don't but rather lead to free things like ebooks, whitepapers, trials, webinars etc. This tactic is a great way to collect valuable information about your customers such as their email addresses which is gold for your company as it helps your company stay in touch with a customer.
Of course, you can also use your call-to-action button to get your customer immediately to your product.
In fact, research shows that companies that are actively blogging generate 55% more leads, 97% more inbound links and 434% more indexed pages. Even more reason for you to start blogging today!
#3 You can position yourself as an expert in your field
With your blog post you can demonstrate your expertise in a specific subject. Showing your customers that you are an expert in your field is highly valuable as people tend to buy from companies that offer the most valuable information and with whom they have established a relationship. From health product store to plumbers and lawyers, customer want to see that they actually know what companies are talking about. By putting up a blog and providing valuable content, you can position yourself as an expert in your field and as a go-to source for your customer.
However, as with SEO, too, this strategy takes time. One blog post won't be enough to make people consider you an expert in your field. People have to see that you are sharing valuable content on a constant basis. Thus, writing one blog post every other month won’t do it. You should at least blog every week, if possible even more often.
#4 Blogging gives your company a voice
Let’s assume you’re a customer looking for superfoods. You go online and start to look for information on that topic. You find two companies that both offer great products for similar prices. But: Company A has a blog. On that blog they don’t just offer valuable information on nutrition and superfoods which gives them the position of an expert, but they also use their blog to present themselves to their customers. In several blog posts, they explain where they produce their superfoods, how they started their company and why it’s important to them to donate a certain amount of money to specific organisations.
Company B on the other hand, doesn’t offer any content. Now here is my question: Where would you buy your superfood? I’m guessing it would be company A. They not only position themselves as an expert in the field, but also present themselves and their company’s values to the customers. That makes them very relatable and people like to buy from companies they feel they know.
Thus, don’t only share content about your field of expertise but also share who you are as a company. Connect with your customers and make them feel as if they know you and what you as a company stand for. Take a position! No more maybe, or I feel like, be bold, dare to have an opinion on things. Not everybody will like it but to those who agree you will be even more relatable.
#5 Blogging helps you engage with your customers
As I said before, people like to buy from companies which they feel they know. Also the fact that they feel a company cares about them is a great buying motivation. Blogging is a great way to show your customers that you in fact do care about them. Get personal with them, use humor and don’t be afraid to go a little off-topic.
Use the comments to engage with your customers. Don’t forget to reply to comments you get on your blog, even if they are negative ones. Show people that you hear them, that they are important and engage with them. That’s how you get loyal customers who are gladly coming back to you for more helpful content.
