Why Your Small Business Needs a Blog
Nowadays, a big part of business is done online. Customers find products, services, and service providers on the internet—through web searches, social media, and online reviews. So for small businesses, it’s crucial to have a strong internet presence, regardless of your industry or line of work. And blogging can be a great way to bolster that internet presence.
Build Your Small Business with a Blog
Establishing a blog comes with numerous benefits—both to your business and to your clients. Blogging helps to get your name out as an expert in your subject area. It can help build your site’s SEO. It can provide useful or interesting content to potential clients. It can help establish your credibility… and a whole lot more.
Here’s why your small business needs a blog.
Blogging boosts SEO
One of the biggest perks to starting a blog is the SEO boost. Search engines like Google love fresh content, and blogs are an easy way to get new content onto your site without having to clutter up your site by creating additional pages.
Blogging also provides an opportunity to insert specific keywords into your posts, thus bulking your SEO for those keywords. You can also add links to relevant pages across your site, which helps to build up the SEO for those pages. All in all, it’s a win-win!
Blogging establishes you as an area expert
Writing a blog post is a great way to show your clients that you’re an expert in your line of work. No matter what you do, you can probably find a way to showcase your expertise. Show off your latest construction project, that luxurious home you just sold, or the amazing haircut your last client just walked out with.
Even if your business doesn’t deliver a concrete product, you can still establish yourself as an expert in your field. Pick a subject relevant to your line of work and write about it. For example, a real estate agent might want to detail some upcoming community events to let clients know they’re really in tune with the local happenings. An interior designer might write about current design trends. And a contractor might outline the process for a specific renovation project. Don’t be afraid to be creative!
Blogging encourages client interaction & drives traffic
The ultimate goal of a blog is to create content that’s relevant and useful to your clients. Should a client like what you’re writing, they might reply to your blog. They might share it. This encourages more readers to interact, reply, and share, which gets more eyes on your post—and your business.
In short, interesting, quality blogs can drive traffic—to your social media, to your blog, to your site, and to your business. And the more eyeballs you can get, the more potential clients you’ll have!
Blogging builds your brand
Building your brand is essential to establishing steady business. But your brand is more than just the product or service you produce; it goes a lot deeper. What makes your company unique? What’s your mission? What are your values? Why should clients choose you over other businesses that offer a similar service or product?
Blogging can help you set your business apart from the competition. You can establish a voice (a particular tone or way of speaking/writing) that might distinguish you as fun and friendly or professional and no-nonsense. You can share your story. You can highlight unique details about your business. Overall, blogs are a way for you to add a little bit of character to your company.
What Makes a Good Business Blog?
You’re pretty convinced now that you need a blog for your small business, right? (If you’re not, maybe go back and re-read? You need one!) But what makes a good blog?
Here are a few little tips to get your blog looking (and working) great.
Use WordPress
WordPress is probably the most popular blogging platform on the internet. Why? Because it’s free, it comes with a lot of easy-to-use plugins, and it allows you to customize to your heart’s content.
Your main site doesn’t even have to be through WordPress… you can easily set up a new website for your blog and link it to your main site. You can likely even do this using a subdomain (blog.yoursite.com) or subdirectory (yoursite.com/blog). To do this, you’ll have to set up a subdomain with your web host and install WordPress.
Keep your styling similar
If your blog is on a different platform than your main site, it might be tempting to pick a whole new template or design for your blog. However, to avoid giving the user the impression that they’ve left your site, you want to keep your styling as similar as possible. Try to use the same fonts, colors, font sizes, and design elements on your blog that are used on your main site.
Decide what kind of blog to write
Depending on your business, the content for your blogs could vary from blog to blog, or it could follow a structured theme. Ideally, you want to choose something in line with your product, service, or company.
Two companies with 5-star blogs
Need an example? Here are two local companies that do blogging better than most!
Raleigh Woodworks is a construction company focuses their writing on sharing knowledge and behind-the-scenes moments of home design and construction. Their blogs range from home projects to design and styling trends to DIY tips and more. They also share a lot of images of past products—which combines useful information with a little bit of product showcasing.
Elite Builders Group, a group of real estate agents in the Triangle, uses their knowledge of the area to create an engaging and SEO-friendly travel blog called Favorite Things. Each month, they showcase Triangle and North Carolina favorites on a particular topic—from barbecue joints to fall activities to coffee shops and more.
Ready to Get Your Small Business Blog Going?
Blogging might SOUND pretty great, but the reality is that a lot of business owners just don’t have the time to sit down, plan blog topics, write them, and post them. It can be a lot of work, especially if you’re not entirely sure what you’re doing. That’s where we come in!
At Corridor Consulting, we know a thing or two about blogging… and we’d love to help you get yours going! Whether you just need help setting up or you need someone to manage and write blogs for you, we’re here to help! Contact us today and let’s talk about your business.