A blog can increase your sales and profit. In his new Wordtracker Masterclass book, Blogging for Business,
Chris Garrett gives a detailed guide on how to run a successful blog.
Here, Chris lists 13 reasons why your business needs a blog.
1. Attract an audience
Every business needs traffic, whether this is foot traffic in a high
street store or 'eyeballs' to an online store. A good blog not only
generates traffic, but also helps retain that traffic, keeping people
coming back and growing in loyalty.
2. Inform, interact and learn from your audience
Informed and educated visitors become confident, loyal customers.
More people are turning to the internet to research before they buy. You
can position your company as a go-to resource, thereby winning more
business. Plus, with blogging, information flows both ways. You can gain
insights into your customers' minds, their needs, challenges and
preferences. Comments, feedback forms, surveys and polls become instant,
spontaneous market research tools. It’s like working with a free focus
group that tells you which products you should create and why.
3. Retain your audience
Too many marketers focus on gaining initial visibility through
advertising or attention-seeking stunts. If that tactic does not convert
into instant sales, the budget and effort are wasted. With a blog you
can hold prospects' interest for longer, winning customers round over
time, and bringing them back to hear from you long after their first
contact. No need for spammy, desperate-sounding sales messages.
4. Energize your audience
Even better than a growing, loyal audience is a growing, loyal
audience that takes action. A blog can motivate your visitors to do
things. All you need is copy that warms them up, a motivating story and a
clear call to action.
5. Recruit help, contacts, employees
Why spend thousands on recruitment consultants and advertising when
you have the best recruitment mechanism at your fingertips? Your blog
audience is the most likely to respond and the most likely to be
appropriate future employees and networking contacts.
6. Respond to stories and customers
Customer service and public relations have never been more important;
a bad story can spread around the web’s social networks at speed. Your
blog becomes a responsive outlet to explain your side of any story and
douse the fires of negative activity.
7. Links for direct traffic
You can’t beat valuable, authoritative content for attracting links
from other websites, forums, discussion lists and social networks. These
links bring a quantity of attention, as well as quality, targeted
visitors that turn into good leads.
8. Links for SEO
As well as the direct traffic benefit of leads, links are important
in bringing in search visitors. The more linkable your website, the
better your search results will be. Very often traditional websites are
difficult to link to and not easy for search engines to index. This can
be due to the website's structure, the software it's built with, or its
overly complex URLs. Blogs are almost always superior in this respect.
9. Building trust and familiarity
Trust is vital in making sales and important for encouraging visitors
to opt into your lead-generation process. By starting with compelling
information and resources, and by encouraging repeat communication, you
build familiarity. Over time, this creates a strong bond of trust,
making sales so much easier.
10. Branding
This positive attention and these value-based, long-term experiences
don’t just create trust. They help to create a stronger, better brand.
This leads to word-of-mouth advertising, which is one of the best forms
of promotion you can get.
11. Grow a community
Through discussion, interaction and comments, you can help forge a
sense of community that can be strengthened both online and off.
12. Offer better service
Your blog provides multiple routes for customers and prospects to get
in touch. It can show your human, approachable side, allow better
customer interaction, and improve customer service.
13. Initiate more sales
All of these benefits add up to more new and repeat sales from much happier and better informed customers.
About Chris Garrett
Chris Garrett is an internet consultant, writer, web geek and co-author of the popular ProBlogger Book.
Since 1994, Chris has helped thousands of individuals, non-profits,
small businesses and blue chips make the most of the web. In 2005 Chris
founded OMIQ to help organizations attract, engage and retain audiences
online. You can find out more, and grab two free ebooks, by visiting his
blog at chrisg.com
Chris is the author of Wordtracker's new e-book, Blogging for Business.
http://www.wordtracker.com/academy/business-blogging-reasons
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