This is 2018; we shouldn’t be asking this question, right? Wrong. A quick search on Google reveals that business owners, especially small and local businesses struggle to understand the impact adding a blog for social media on their website will have on their marketing strategy, visibility, and overall brand reputation.
Now, throw in the fact that; to see real success with blogging requires patience and a considerable amount of time not to mention also, that blogging places a huge demand on the business resources which in most cases, these businesses don’t have.
In spite of this misgivings and challenges, are there compelling reasons why small business owners should integrate blogging into their online marketing efforts?
Why Businesses need a Blog
- It drives traffic to your website: You have your website setup because you need people to know about your business. Unfortunately, having just a business website doesn’t guarantee that your site will be found online.
The thing is the contents of your business website aren’t enough to draw the kind of traffic that would lead to a steady stream of leads for your business. Here’s where integrating a blog to your website comes in play; with a blog, you’re able to consistently post fresh contents that search engines index which in the long-term leads to increased traffic to your site.
- Drives long-term results: here’s my favorite; one blog post has the potential to pull in traffic continually and leads for your business even after several months and years of publishing.
It doesn’t require you do anything else since most of the work has already been done. To give you real-life example, Corey Wainwright at HubSpot, wrote that about 70 percent of the traffic to their blog and 90 percent of the new leads per month comes from old contents they’ve published – that’s basically lead generation on auto-pilot.
- It positions your brand as an authority: People are more likely to respond favorably if they had come across a content you published that was helpful to them even before they’re ready for your service/product. Imagine how easier closing deals would be for your team, and the ‘pulling power’ they would have if your brand is perceived as an authority in the industry.
There you have the reasons why you should add a blog to your business website; however, before starting the blog, here are some questions that need an answer:
Questions to answer before starting your blog
Can you consistently produce contents?
Blogs run on the engine of contents, posting regular articles consistently not only signals search engines to crawl and index your website; it also projects the impression of an active, professional business to your visitors.
So, before starting the blog, ensure you’ve worked out how and who will be responsible for the content development.
Do you have the time?
Honestly, blogging requires a considerable amount of time. You’d need to research a keyword, research a topic, then set time to do the writing; and all these takes tons of time to accomplish.
If you’re time-strapped, it might be advisable to either hire a staff or outsource to a professional agency to handle the task for you.
What’s your distribution plan?
It’s not enough to publish posts; you must get tons of eyeballs on them. The only way to do that is devising a distribution strategy for your contents; this doesn’t have to be complicated though, creating accounts on social media and scheduling when to share your post is a good start. Also, integrating social share buttons on your site make it easier for others to share your contents.
In conclusion, do you think you need a blog for your business? Do the benefits outweigh the hassles of running one? I hope this article guides you to make the decision that’s right for your business.