Business blogging – should you get into it ? Yes, you should.
However, one important point to remember, especially in this age of digital marketing, is that no one single marketing action will be a solution all by itself for the achievement of all your business goals.
When a client’s eyes glaze over as I launch into the merits of business blogging, I need to remind them that it is just one of many actions that can be taken to help towards the ultimate goal of more (profitable) business. Now, there are digital marketing gurus out there who would contend that only digital (online) marketing matters anymore. That’s nonsense.
So, commitment to business blogging is no more than that – commitment to one more marketing action. Commitment to communicating with your clients at whatever rate we can manage. What nobody wants to see is clients blogging all day every day at the expense of work that more directly makes the till tick over. No.
If you are a micro-enterprise with few (if any) employees, then a reasonable target is to blog once per fortnight, or per week if achievable. You may not manage that (I don’t), but do try. A typical post in a sector where not many others are business blogging might have a lifespan of around 30 hours. In other words, if you publish on Tuesday at midday, its effect will be gone by Wednesday dinner time. Having said that, its lifespan can be lengthened by retweeting at later dates and linking separate but related blogposts to eachother. Know that in a fast-moving sector, where lots of posts are being generated, yours will have a much shorter lifespan.
Use management tools like Hootsuite or Socialoomph to increase the reach of posts. Use dlvr.it to have your blogposts repeated out on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn (free version).
In 2016, a great new service I’ve discovered is Missinglett_r, where even the free plan gives you nine tweet-outs of each of your new blogposts, with handy little snippets to attract readers.
When writing your blogpost, be conscious of the fact that people may be reading it off-website, thanks to the tools above. Include links back to your site, to keep driving readers back to specific pages, to where you are selling or promoting.
And don’t forget Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). Without SEO, your blogpost will not be found – in which case, it might as well not exist. The number of blogs I come across that simply do not have any SEO plugin or functionality is huge. Indeed, many more have SEO functionality, but the blogger was not taught about it by their so-called website designer. Essentially, be sure that your post has a unique focus keyword – one that no previous post has had. Make each post focus on a different aspect of your business, a new product or service, a new piece of advice, or a new “how-to”. Go and learn about the basics of SEO and inform yourself about your site. Read this article about Basic SEO.
Is blogging about making sales ? Not directly, it isn’t. It’s about PR. Is PR good ? Sure, but it’s not direct sales. It’s softer, slower, less obvious, more subtle. It’s marketing. Get into it.
Business Blogging with wp.org
I blog on WordPress.org, using themes from Woothemes and SEO from Yoast. Watch out! Don’t confuse the business blogging friendly wp.org with the less SEO strong, essentially hobby-friendly wp.com.
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