Blogging Basics for Businesses

What is a blog?

A blog is a place online where you can share your thoughts with an infinite audience — think of it as a place where you can publish articles about your business or related to your industry. A blog post is like a journal entry or informative article. You can share your thoughts, ideas, things you’re working on or selling, events you’ve attended or events you’re hosting — anything really!

Why should I blog?

You can use a blog to promote yourself or your business and drive traffic to other parts of your website.

Blogs tend to be less formal and more conversational than other parts of a website. You can use a blog to let the personality of your brand show through, or give readers a peek at the real person or people behind your business.

A blog is typically updated much more frequently than the other sections of a website. We recommend writing a blog post weekly. This is a great way to stay current and relevant to your target audience, and also great for SEO (search engine optimization). Search engines love websites with frequently updated content!

What should I blog about?

Blog about things relevant to your target audience and related to your business.

For instance, if you own an ice cream shop, you might want to blog about the most popular flavors of ice cream or the locally sourced ingredients you use. Say you have a coffee shop in downtown South Park — blog about festivals and events going on in that area.

Blog posts should rarely be all about a product promotion. There are plenty of other areas of your website to have advertisements. When people come to your blog, they’re interested in learning something, not being sold something.

Your blog post content should be centered around three main things: content that is interesting or informative to your target audience, content that is somehow related to the product or service your business offers, and content that is about or mentions the geographic region you’re targeting.

Each post doesn’t have to have all three components, perhaps each post features just one or two, but putting all three together will make the best content for both your readers and SEO.

How can I promote my blog?

Link to your blog prominently from the main pages of your website. Feature links to your latest blog posts on social media and in email marketing.

You can also look for online communities that have asked questions that one of your blog posts have answered and share your relevant blog post link there.

Conclusion

Blogging is a simple and effective way to reach your target audience and current or potential customers on a personal level.

Have you started a blog recently or follow a blog you think is a good example? Share it in the comments!