Blogging for your business

Can having a blog for your business help increase revenue? With a whole host of professional bloggers out there now, jumping on the bandwagon can seem a bit daunting.

However, we believe in blogging being beneficial to your business. From getting your name out there and forging new relationships, to marketing promotions and increasing revenue, there’s plenty of ways to give your business a boost from blogging. Find out the basics of how right here.

What is blogging?

Essentially blogging is writing or adding new material and content to a website in reverse chronological order in an often informal diary-like style. Blogging can consist of many mediums but traditionally a blogger writes about events, situations, topics, trends and more. Nowadays videos, or vlogging, as well as podcasts are rising in popularity as another way to blog.

So why should I create a blog for my business?

If you can create relevant, valuable content to attract your target audience, with the aim of driving sales, then you are transferring the basic principles of a blog into what pros call ‘content marketing.’ In a nutshell, if you as a business offer information that is valuable to your customers through content (i.e. blogs), then they will reward you with their custom and loyalty.

From blog to content

Content marketing requires a little more sharpness and strategy than blogging. So you should still be producing blog posts, but also think about white papers, reports, videos, case studies, newsletters, presentations, articles, and even useful links to social media.

Plan ahead

It’s a good idea to plan a content calendar for a minimum of a month in advance, which includes the type of content you are generating, which platform it will be used on and who is responsible for creating it. There’s some great free content calendar templates on the web too to help you. With a calendar nothing gets skipped and everyone is clear about who’s in charge of what.

How easy is it? And how much?

Blogs in particular are a free and easy way to introduce content marketing to your company. In the words of Jack Johnson himself, reduce, re-use and recycle. Audit your existing content and you’ll be amazed by what you already have available to use. That’s the quickest and simplest way to start out.

Sharing is caring

Seek out bloggers in your sector for content contributions or swaps as this can extend your own reach to their network and vice versa. This is how you can build your influence and forge new relationships that could lead to other partnerships. It’s not just about creating content but connecting contributors to your audience too, and it’s super important that the relationship between the two is natural and fits just right.

Before hitting send and inviting a contributor, take a minute to think, what value will your contributor add and why should your audience care? Chasing a big name might not be the best thing for your particular audience and you might not get much value for it either. So, when you approach a potential contributor, lead with what you have to offer in terms of exposure, and be genuine in your interest. Offer as much creative input as possible, and the more you give, the more you’ll get back in return.

Get sociable

Share content through as many channels as you can; for example, mention your blog in your newsletter or in your email signature to optimise coverage and gain more click-throughs. And of course share on all your social channels, making sure to watch for tone of voice. For example, you wouldn’t speak to customers on LinkedIn the same way you would on Instagram. Make sure you know where your customers like to be sociable online, and reach out to them there.

That should be just enough to get you started with your own content marketing plan. If you can create content that educates, solicits positive feelings or challenges assumptions and proves your reader wrong, you are more likely to see your content passed on and you can build up a loyal audience. It really is that simple.