Creating a business blog is a great way to energize your marketing and build awareness for your business on the internet.
Blogging can be helpful in a handful of ways:
Build credibility – Start developing a relationship and trust with potential customers, allow them to get to know the way you think and what you value as a business.
Lead Generation – It is said to take up to seven touch points before a prospect will contact you. Your business blog can help position you as an industry expert.
Search Engine Optimization – When used correctly and written effectively, your business blog will become your number one source for traffic generated by search engines.
Community – Like other interactive social tools, your business blog can allow for open communication and transfer of knowledge with your readers.
What should I write about and does this take a lot of time?
Write about what you know and are passionate about. Be sure to use those words that you’ve identified as your organizations mission critical keyword phrases. Write as often as possible, and be sure to be very conversational in tone and style. Each post need not be “War and Peace”, just enough information to communicate a point effectively.
Here are a few ideas:
- Write posts about common problems to prospects in your industry
- Related industry news or trends
- Best practices common to your industry
- Important events
- Unique products and services
- Related case studies
- New business wins that you recently acquired
Where do I start?
The two most popular platforms are Wordpress and Blogger. You can either setup a free template, which is generally not advisable because they tend to look “Free”, you can purchase a premium template or you can custom design from scratch to match the look and feel of your corporate website. I would recommend getting a dedicated domain (www.ecentric.ca) as opposed to the free Wordpress assigned URL’s. This again looks more professional and allows you more flexibility when configuring your blog.
What do I need to get started?
STRATEGY & OBJECTIVES… Before you rush out and set up a free or premium template, it is critical to the success of your business blog to have defined your blog strategy and the objectives of what you hope to gain by dedicating time on a regular basis to this particular marketing activity.
If this sounds like something that your business should start doing, please give us a call at ecentric media. We’ll help define your blog strategy and get you pointed in the right direction.
