Running Small Business Blogs
Regardless of the type of business you’re in, or what kind of company you have, you need to have a business blog and start blogging about your products and services.
Even if you don’t consider yourself a writer or blogger, you still need to get blogging, especially in today’s ultra-competitive global online economy.
If anything, running a business blog is essential because it offers another way to touch and connect with your existing and potential customers.
Getting a business blog up and running is easy to do. If you set up a business blog on a platform like WordPress, then you will not only have a business blog that is easy to manage, but you will also have a vehicle that gives you full control of your online presence.
There are several great reasons to start your own business blog. Here are just 5 ways to get you thinking about a business blog of your own:
#1 – Small Business Blogs Help You Create A More Personal Connection With Your Customers
Like social media, your blog gives you the opportunity to connect with your customers on a deeper and more personal level.
Traditionally, most websites are composed of static pages that “talk at” users. In other words, they simply tell other people about your business. A business blog can help you “talk with” your readers, because blogs can be made to be interactive.
Running a business blog allows you to start a dialogue or conversation with your visitors. Your blog readers can leave comments after each article you post, which you can reply to. This both helps your audience to get to know you better, as well as helping you to better understand the needs of your market.
Your blog can also help give your business a human face and a social presence. There are many interactive “add-ons” you can add to your business blog to help you improve the way you connect with your customers and visitors.
With WordPress, for example, you can go beyond just replying to visitor comments and add additional interactive functionality to your blog using third-party applications called “plugins” that integrate seamlessly and easily with your blog to provide extra features like:
- Personal Greetings
- Contact Forms
- Facebook Comments
- Social Sharing Buttons
- Click-To-Call Buttons
- Polls
- Surveys
- Maps
- Customer Reviews And Testimonials
- Forums
- Interactive Chat / Video Chat Facilities
- Interactive Webinars
- Customer Support Help Desk
- Software That Tracks And Monitors Visitor Behaviour On Your Site
- Etc…
We provide training, information and reviews on using many of these interactive plugins in other blog posts and in our user training section.
#2 – Small Business Blogs Help You Build Expertise And Credibility
One of the best things about having a business blog is that it gives you an opportunity to establish your expertise and build your reputation and credibility in your field.
No matter what business you’re in, there is so much you probably know that you can blog about. By sharing your knowledge with others, you are not only educating people about your business, you are also educating them about “how” to do business with you, and positioning your products and services in the forefront of the minds of those who are searching for, and who need products and services like those you provide.
For example, if you’re a law firm, blog about common legal questions that people have and what can be done (i.e. What your firm can do) to help solve legal issues. If you’re a chiropractor, write about ways to maintain a healthy posture and prevent back pain. If you’re an environmentally-conscious cleaning company, share some great house cleaning tips and the dangers of using chemical cleaners.
You can add informative and educational content to your business blog that will help build your credibility and expertise like tips, case studies, reviews and comparisons, etc. In a number of exciting ways.
For example, you can add videos to your YouTube channel and stream these on your blog. This not only helps you build credibility, it also gives your business additional exposure online.
You can add infographs to your content and share these on Pinterest …
You can start a regular audio broadcast section where you present interviews with other experts in your field, or run webinars where you train customers to use your products.
By using your blog to show your website visitors how much you know about your industry and your business, you will help them get to know you better, like you more and trust you more. This builds credibility and helps your business grow more sales.
#3 – Small Business Blogs Provide Customized Marketing
Blogging offers a much more effective and affordable way to promote your business than most other methods of marketing, both online and offline.
For example, did you know that a WordPress-powered business blog can be configured so that as soon as you publish new content on your site, your information is instantly distributed to all of the main search engines (e.g. Google, Bing), announced on all of the main social networks (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest) and added to dozens of other authoritative online directories (e.g. Content and news feed aggregators)?
With a static website, your web pages just sit inside your server. You have to actively drive visitors to your site with methods like paid advertising to get new prospects.
With an expertly-configured WordPress blog, however, you can start driving new visitors and targeted prospects to your site just by adding new content about your business. All that is required to automate this process is having a WordPress blog set up for your business, and then getting someone who knows how to expertly configure your blog settings to tweak a few settings and link your blog to some external accounts using a few tools and methods that are freely available to online users.
Ultimately, the most cost-effective form of marketing a business online is to get organic traffic (i.e. “Free traffic). You can achieve this simply by writing content about your business on a regular basis and posting it on your expertly-configured WordPress blog.
Also, by reading your visitors’ comments, and adding interactive features to your blog like statistical and behavioural monitoring tools and learning how to interpret the data, you can start getting information on your target market and using this intelligence to improve your business marketing.
#4 – A Business Blog Benefits You In The Search Engines
Adding a blog to your static website is a great way to attract traffic from search engines.
We’ve talked about the benefits of having an expertly-configured blog to automatically notify search engines whenever new content is posted. Search engines favour sites that have fresh, updated content. So, if you set up a business blog, get it expertly-configured and then consistently write just one blog post per week, you will see more visitors coming your way, especially if you choose a few good keywords with a reasonable amount of searches for your posts.
Do the same thing, but write two or three blog posts each week and your traffic will increase significantly.
#5 – A Business Blog Increases Visibility For Your Products And Services
Through your blog, you can let your existing and potential new customers know about your products and services. You can inform them about discounts, special offers, new inventory and discontinued items, events and so much more! You can even extend your blog’s reach into social media so that every post you add to your blog shows up on social sites as well.
Blogging isn’t like writing an award-winning novel. Identify your ideal customer, and focus on their wants, needs, interests and their questions. Write short, conversational posts as if you’re speaking directly to them. Pick topics related to your business and share your expertise with them through informative and educational articles. Your blog doesn’t need to reinvent the wheel; it just needs to be helpful and engaging to visitors.
Small Business Blogs
One last tip: Don’t let concerns like “not having enough time” and “not being a good writer” stop you from starting a business blog. The truth is, in today’s Information Age, you cannot afford to not have a vehicle like a business blog, where you can share your expertise and build credibility and trust by engaging and interacting online directly with your customers and prospects, answering their questions and providing them with helpful and useful information.
