The business case for blogging
With inbound leads costing 61% less than outbound leads, it’s easy to see why 81% of businesses now report that their company blog is useful to critical for their business.
- Companies that blog get on average 55% more website visitors than those that do not.
- 57% of companies that blog report that they have acquired customer/s from their blog.
- And 92% of companies who blog multiple times per day report that they have acquired customer/s from their blog.
[Ref: The 2012 State of Inbound Marketing Report, Hubspot]
Choosing the right blogging platform
There are many available blogging platforms to choose from with each one having strengths and weaknesses. However, if you are looking for the best option for business, there is only one winner; WordPress.
- WordPress is a free open source blogging tool and content management system (CMS)
- It’s the most popular blogging system and is used by over 16.7% of Alexa Internet’s “top 1 million” websites
- Features include a plug-in architecture and template system
Questions to ask before you start blogging
Many people and businesses, who fail at blogging, do so because they didn’t properly understand the challenges; they started blogging with unrealistic goals and expectations. Building an audience for your blog is going to take time and consistency, start off by defining your audience and readers.
Ask yourself:
- Who exactly do you want to read the blog?
- Can they become your customers?
- Which content would they find valuable?
- How often will you need to post to generate a return?
If content is king, then networking is queen! You’re going to also have to build relationships and grow a community around your blog and its content. Networking will be a key skill in how fast you can attempt to grow.
Are you ready to?
- Comment on other blogs
- Share content
- Guest post
What to write about?
Coming up with ideas for blog posts is something that most business bloggers struggle with initially. Here are ten suggestions for posts that are proven to work:
Lists
People love lists and it is easy to come up with ideas for list type posts. List ideas can be quickly researched and written up when compared to other types of posts.
Link round ups
Pick a topic and build a useful resource post by linking out to other bloggers and their content. Linking out in this way is also a great way to network online and it encourages those bloggers mentioned to comment and share.
Reviews
Reviews are an easy way to create blog posts and you can review just about anything.
Interviews
Think about the interesting people you know and you’ll quickly realize how easy it is to create a series of blog post interviews. Interviews can also be used to network with customers and influencers within your industry.
Crowd sourced
Crowd source your posts by asking your network for their contributions. These people are then also more likely to comment, share and help promote these posts.
How to
Writing a how to post is an effective way to tap into people’s needs.
Case studies
What better way to create unique blog content and promote your business, than by writing case studies about the clients and the work that you have carried out.
Controversy
Challenging the status quo is an effective way to differentiate your writing and generate interest and engagement. Be careful not to be controversial, simply for the sake of it!
Questions
You don’t always need to know the answer to create a great blog post. Asking questions in your writing is another way to create interesting and engaging content.
Best of your blog
If you have been blogging for a while, you will have built up an archive. You can easily use this content to create a roundup of your most popular or interesting posts.
How to format your posts for internet readers
The online reader discovers and reads content differently. According to CopyBlogger, Brian Clark: “On average, 8 out of 10 people will read headline copy, but only 2 out of 10 will read the rest”
Title
He goes on to say “This is the secret to the power of your title, and why it so highly determines the effectiveness of the entire piece”. The more effective and catchy your headline, the better your chances are of getting clicked on and read by the right type of people.
First paragraph
After someone clicks through the first text they see will be your first paragraph, it’s like your post’s elevator pitch! Can it continue to hold the reader’s attention? Does it explain what the content is about? Does it communicate the “what it’s in it for me” for the reader?
Images
Images add the visual element that helps you to communicate, with more impact! Also, if you consider social media platforms such as Facebook, not using images will put you at a significant disadvantage in the newsfeed.
Sub-headings
People scan rather than read from start to finish through online. Using sub headings (H2s & H3s) breaks up the posts providing the reader with the opportunity to scan and digest at different levels.
Paragraph length
Shorter rather than longer paragraphs work best online. A good way to manage paragraph length is to stop at the end of three sentences and then start to figure out the transition to the next paragraph.
Bullet points and numbering
Bullet points and numbering further help break up your posts and make them more readable.
How to optimize your posts for SEO
There are 175 million blogs producing around 1 million new blog posts every day, ensuring that your blog and posts rank is a big challenge. “Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine’s “natural” or un-paid (“organic” or “algorithmic”) search results. In general, the earlier (or higher ranked on the search results page), and more frequently a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine’s users” wikipedia.org
Keyword research
There are many tools available incl:
Keyword research allows you to confirm or find out about what people are searching for. When deciding which keywords will work best, consider those that offer you:
- Relevance
- Lots of searches
- Less competition
If I built apps?
Say, I was an app developer and I wanted to write a blog post to target businesses who might like to build an app. I might consider that “We build apps for your business” is a good title for a blog post, but is it?
If I go to Google keywords tool and search for “We build apps for your business” I get 0 searches! Next, let’s input “apps for your business”. OK, that’s better, it shows 2900 searches per month.
However, If I scroll down the page, I see the keywords “How to make apps” which has 450000 searches and is of medium competition.
I like this keyword opportunity because:
- It has lots of traffic potential
- It is not too competitive
- And the people who are searching for it, are looking for actionable information
However, it still has some weaknesses:
- It’s very broad
- And it only weakly relates to my target audience
Titles
So how can I optimize “How to make apps”, so that I’m targeting the right type of reader? In my example: businesses that might be considering building (and paying for) an app?
Let’s look at some titles that will make my blog post more razor-sharp:
- “How to make apps to get your business downloaded”
- “How to make apps that deliver new customers and more sales”
- “How to make apps that return on your business investment”
Note: Position your keywords nearer the start of your title as search engines and people put more weight on the early words
Meta description
Meta descriptions are the short descriptions that show up in search results along with the link to your blog post:
- They should be no longer than 150 characters
- And front loaded with your chosen keywords
H2 and H3 headings
Ideally, you also want to include your keywords in your H2 and/or H3 headings.
- My H2 heading above is “How to write
SEO Friendly Blog Posts?” - Includes “SEO Friendly Blog Posts” which are the focus keywords for this post
To do this in the HTML version of your website, write the following text:
<h2>Headline Text</h2>
Or
<h3>Headline Text</h3> for H3
Note: WordPress and other content management systems have this option in the format menu.
Images
When an image is unavailable, “Alt Text” ensures no information or functionality is lost. However they are rarely used by content creators.
Use the alt text to incorporate your chosen keywords adding additional
Links
Readers, other bloggers and even search engines (such as Google) love links. When linking internally or out, the text that you choose to hyperlink (called “Anchor Text,”) is very important. Rather than using words like “click here” – incorporate links into suitable keywords. Do this within the text of your blog post using words that best describe – where that particular link goes to.
Where linking to another site, make sure readers are opening a new browser window. This ensures that they are less likely to permanently leave your website, for the other site.
Keyword density
Your keywords need to be sprinkled in the text of your article, but you need to also be careful of overdoing it (called keyword stuffing). Aim for a ratio of between 1-3%. For example: In a 600 word article, repeat the keywords between 6 and 18 times.
Business blogging ROI
- Traffic: Aprilaire, an indoor air condition supplies company generated 1,000 percent traffic growth in one year from blogging.
- Leads: Louis E. Page, a B2B distributor of mesh and fencing saw an 850% increase in sales leads since launching their blog.
- Conversions: Kinaxis, a supply chain management company were already seen results from their blogging efforts when they invited outside bloggers to blog next to internal employees, resulting in an 2.7 times increase in website traffic and 3.2 times increase in conversions.
- Sales: Hinda Incentives, a provider of web-based motivational programs for businesses have seen several hundred thousand dollars of sales opportunities since launching their blog.
- Growth: River Pools and Spas, a small business that sold swimming pools achieved significant growth by adding a blog to their marketing plan.
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