7 Reasons To Write A Business Blog – Pt 1

Unless you’ve been camped in a Himalayan mountain cave, chanting to heathen gods for the past five years, I’m sure you’ve heard of blogs and noticed how popular they’ve become.

And at this stage you may be wondering how running a blog has any relevance for a small business owner like yourself, operating out here in the real world as opposed to cyberspace.

After all, blogs are for kids and tech-geeks right?

Well…not really – not anymore.

Blogs have become one of the most powerful marketing tools used by businesses around the world, regardless of how much business they do online.

Blogs are being used be anyone from a small business owner such as myself (technically this website is a blog), all the way through to multinational giants such as Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson, Nike & Xerox.

Why Is That?

The reason is actually fairly simple – blogs are all about communication. And not just the one-way communication of the old style website – I’m talking interaction between business and consumer.

Prospects can have their questions answered and businesses can learn what their prospects want. It’s a two way street that benefits both parties.

I’ve listed below some reasons why blogging for business can be such a powerful tool. These aren’t the only reasons, but they are among the most powerful.

If you think any of these are relevant to your own business, than it might be worth thinking about installing a blog of your own

Building Relationships

I’m sure as a business owner you know all about the marketing funnel – you get people into your buying funnel when  they are in the research phase of the decision process, and you move them through to the point where they become a (hopefully) loyal customer.

Blogs are extremely effective at streamlining this process for your business. If the prospect isn’t ready to make a purchase yet, you direct them to your blog where they can find more information about your business and what you can offer.

This gives you a greater chance of convincing the prospect they should choose your business over your competitors

People Trust Blogs (For Now Anyway)

This is kind of a strange one – its almost an example of psychological conditioning.

At the moment people are less wary of blogs because of their origins as a means of communication. There is almost in innate sense of trust that if you visit someones blog they are not going to put the hard sell on you.

As an example, if you were to send out two emails to your list – one which said ‘go and check this out at our website’, and another which said ‘go and check this out at our blog’, I could almost guarantee that you would get a higher conversion rate from the second email than the first – even if they were pointed at the exact same content.

So while this situation holds true, you might as well take advantage of it – but make sure that your blog doesn’t become an extended advertorial for your business. Content is king in the blogosphere.

Turn Your Loyal Customers Into Advertisers

There is no more powerful form of advertising than word of mouth. A positive experience from one satisfied customer has the potential to generate large amounts of new business for years to come

Blogs allow you to turn your customers into spokespeople for your business. If they regularly read valuable information on your blog, they will be more than happy to pass the website on to their friends, creating streams of new prospects for your business that cost you nothing to acquire.

NB – this article stretched out a bit more than I thought it would so I split it into two parts

Click here to read the other 4 reasons for having a business blog.

7 Reasons To Write A Business Blog – Pt 2

Click here if you missed the first half of this article

Ability To Generate Customers From Outside Your Geographical Area

Following on from the above point, a blog allows you to more effectively market outside your geographic region. As a general rule blogs rank better in the search engines than static websites.

So if you regularly add content to your blog that is specific to your industry, over time that blog will begin to appear in the search results on Google.

This will deliver new prospects to your business from all over the country (and even the world).

Differentiate Your Business By Building Relationships

One of the major reason that a prospect doesn’t purchase immediately upon coming into contact with your business, is because of that skeptic inside of us all that wants to know a little more info before letting the moths out.

This is particularly the case where your product or service is complex, or where there are a large number of competing businesses in the market

Do you have a local business that you buy from, even though they may be a bit more expensive than a larger competitor – a butcher maybe, or a corner store?

People like to buy from people they know, and your blog gives your prospects the chance to get to know you, making them more likely to buy from you at some stage in the future.

This will differentiate you from the competition, and over time will lead your business to becoming the first that comes to mind when people are looking for the products or services that you offer.

Platform Allows You To Use Many Useful Tools With No Tech Experience

The most popular software for creating your blog is known as Wordpress, which is a free Content Management System that makes creating pages on your blog as simple as typing up a document in Microsoft Word.

Over the years Wordpress has evolved to the point where there are now literally thousands of free tools that you can add to the basic package, which enhance the user experience on your site.

• You can add picture, video and audio with the click of a button.
• You can tie your blog in with other social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
• You can add free downloads, newsletter subscription forms and a whole range of other tools, all of which can help you market your business in new and exciting ways.

And while there is a learning curve (isn’t there with anything?), the major reasons blogs are so popular is because of their ease of use.

Becomes A Business Asset

One thing that people don’t talk about much when it comes to websites, is their value as an asset to your business.

Lets say you were going to sell your business -  the asking price would reflect both the physical assets (land/property/equipment)  and less tangible assets such as goodwill, your client base and brand strength.

Well here’s some news for you – if you have a website that is an extremely powerful tool for lead generation and customer relationship management, you can increase the selling price of your business accordingly.

Your website needs to be looked upon as a business asset – a marketing tool that helps your business grow. If your website systematically delivers new leads to your business, and helps convert them into paying customers then it adds value to your business.

The Next Step…

OK…so there’s seven reasons why your business should have a blog. Your next step is to make the decision to go ahead and add a blog to your website.

In the next article I’ll talk a little more about the world’s most popular blogging platform, and run you through the steps involved in setting your blog up.

If that all sounds like way too much work and you’d like to have it all done for you, feel free to get in touch via the contact form.

Craig