5 advantages of blogs for marketing
No matter what kind of small business you have, writing blog articles is extremely important for a number of reasons. It is a key ingredient in your marketing strategy to increase brand awareness and drive traffic to your website.
Today, there are more than 600 million blogs, from more than 1.7 billion websites. This week, I’m going to share some of the benefits of blogging for marketing and the components of an effective blog post so you can join them.
So first, let’s explore 5 advantages of blogging for marketing:
1. Your blog generates traffic to your website.
Whether you use SEO to help people find your blog, promote it in paid ads, or post it on social media, all paths lead back to your website. The more relevant and search engine optimized blogs you share with the world, the more traffic coming to you.
And once your data shows you which types of content perform best, you can start writing multiple posts related to the most popular topics.
2. Blogs increase your search engine rankings.
Search engines are always looking for new and relevant content. By writing a blog, you are cheaply creating new content for search engines to index.
You should start by doing your research to find relevant, high-volume, low-competition keywords to include in your articles. But you don’t want to stuff your writing with keywords to try and get the attention of search engines, this will actually have the opposite effect.
A professional SEO company can help you create blogs with just the right amount of keywords. Also, read How To Get Higher Blog Post Rankings Using SEO Yoast On Our Website.
3. Valuable content can increase sales
When you share content that adds value to your readers’ lives, they are more likely to buy something from you. Instead of just driving traffic from your paid ads or social media to a website full of links, you can drive people to blog posts that complement your product or service.
Well-written copy offers the perfect opportunity to educate and inspire people, who now better understand the value of what you offer.
4. Blogs build trust among your target audience.
Blogging allows you to connect with website visitors and customers in an authentic way. If you consistently provide high-quality content to your target audience, you will start to be seen as an authority in your industry.
However, you cannot rush to gain people’s trust. Don’t go back to using aggressive sales tactics and churning out a dozen articles in a few weeks expecting a huge increase in readership and sales. Be patient and genuine for the best results.
5. Your presence on social media can benefit…
One of the main advantages of blogging for marketing is that it easily supports your social media efforts.
When you share on social media, people who see and like your content may be tempted to share it with their followers, increasing traffic to your website and increasing awareness of your brand.
Second, you get the opportunity to engage with followers who comment on your posts, which helps build trust and brand loyalty.
Components of an effective blog post
Now that we’ve established the importance of blogging in increasing engagement, let’s look at the components of an effective blog post:
1. A compelling headline: Think about what you’d like to see if you were looking for a solution to your problem. For example, the title of this article is “The Importance of Blogging to Increase Engagement.” Would you want to read it if it was “Why is it important to write a blog”? It is less likely.
2. Subtitle Directive: This is especially useful for longer blogs. Subheadings break up your content and guide your reader to the next step. For example, the section you’re reading now is “Components of an Effective Blog Post,” which tells you exactly what to expect.
3. Well-researched, value-added content – The gist of your article is what people will pay the most attention to. Back up what you say with statistics or research from industry leaders to make it more credible.
Give your readers real-world examples of how your product or service will improve their lives, not just a list of features.
READ: How to excel at engagement-based email marketing.
Engagement-based email marketing is all about how your subscribers interact with your email newsletter. Once they have opened it, you still need to surprise them with its content.
An article can be a great tool for engagement-based email marketing. You can put the full article in the body of the newsletter or just have the first few paragraphs of the article in the newsletter and then link to your blog.
Read more on our website.
4. A strong call to action – Often referred to as a CTA, a call to action is a button, image, or text link that directs the user to the next step in their website experience. (In SEO terms, these steps make up the conversion funnel.)
Without a CTA, the user has no idea where to go next, and risks losing it to another website/competitor. So what are you trying to get your potential customer to do? One of the main components of an effective blog post is letting people know whether to buy now, learn more, download an e-book, etc.
5. Visually appealing graphics – Using images that match your brand can be incredibly attractive. There are so many advantages to using images:
- They help create an emotional connection with readers.
- Many people learn visually, so images help you tell your story in the most effective way.
- Posts with relevant images perform better in search engines.
- Blogs with images receive higher engagement than those without images. For example, Facebook posts with photos receive an average 37% increase in engagement.
6. Good meta description: Basically, meta descriptions provide a description of the content of your post within the search engine.
So when someone is deciding which search engine result to click on, which one do you think they will choose? A creative, custom meta description that encourages them to learn more, or a generated, often irrelevant, meta description generated by the content platform (e.g. WordPress) you use?
There are so many advantages of blogging for marketing. Never underestimate the importance of blogging to increase engagement.
If you take the time to understand your target audience, research the keywords and topic, write compelling copy, and promote it on social media, it will be worth it.
In fact, you may find that your blog is the most powerful marketing tool you have.
For the success of your business,
Suzanne