Everyone has an opinion, and these days, all of them are online. It’s a great thing, as it helps us better understand people on an individual level, in a way direct conversation could never provide. However, that also means the world wide web is a crowded space. How do people and businesses navigate through the noise of social media platforms to say important (or not so important) things to their customers in long form? Blogging.
Traditionally blogging has been seen as a less formal means of communication. There are perceptions of the media as a tool through which people rant or make false claims in a tabloid-like manner. While there are indeed many blogs whose focus include those qualities, like anything in life, there are more than one side to that coin. These days, artists, businesses, and professionals of every kind have turned to blogging as a way to connect with customers in real time. Here’s why:
- Control The Conversation
Depending on the size of your business, there is already information pertaining to your operations online. The information is likely very basic, such as your product or service, location, years in service, etc. Though all of that is important, none of it provides information about your current state, your future plans nor recent achievements. Historically, this information would be disseminated through press releases. Whether or not an established medium who would report on what’s you considered important, was left to chance. Now, businesses have the opportunity to cut out the third party, and talk to directly to customers about situations involving them or topics related to their interests. Many use social media platforms to do this, but, once again, the space is crowded. You should have your own platform, and use social media, instead, as a tool to direct stakeholders there. - Increases Traffic
Constant activity drives traffic to your site through search engines. People use search engines when they are not aware of who you are and what you do, yet are looking for something in relation to what you provide. Resources like Google, Yahoo and Bing crawl your site/blog to determine if what their users are looking for is there. One of the other measures used by these engines to determine whether or not your information is important enough to be shared with their millions of users is how recent your content is. Frequent updates result in higher ranking, which leads to more people finding your site, connecting with your content, and becoming potential customers. - Free Marketing
Thus, you could and should use your blog as a marketing tool, to turn those visitors into leads. To be clear, this should not be the sole purpose of your blog, but including simple call-to-actions, such as: signing up for an email subscription, learning more via your website, or following your organization on social media, can lead to continued interactions that may lead to a permanent relationship. As a note, free is not absolute. Should you choose to create a special domain and purchase hosting for your blog, that is a small cost. However, it pales in comparison to other advertising tools which may not be nearly as effective. In fact, 60% of businesses who blog said they receive more customers than those who don’t.