Now is the perfect time to start your business blog.
If you’re considering setting up a blog but you’re undecided, here are some reasons to help you decide.
1. Give your business greater visibility
We are in the information age and it’s been said that information is the new form of wealth.
Whether or not you agree with this, it’s a fact that all businesses need to do what they can to be more visible.
Maintaining and regularly updating your business blog will help to boost the visibility of your business.
It will allow you to focus on your niche, provide information about your niche and grow that information into a valuable source of reference for your target audience.
2. Create a home for your content marketing
It may be that you’re considering other forms of content marketing, such as video content, podcasting, and as well as live streams and publishing content on social media platforms.
These are all great forms of content marketing, but your blog can be the ‘home’ for all your content by pointing links from all your other content marketing activities towards your blog and bringing traffic to it.
3. Make it easier for your audience to find you and know more about you
Blogging is a form of content marketing and you can use it to help boost your presence online.
Blogging will also make it easier for your audience to find you, find your content, benefit from your knowledge and get to know more about you.
In today’s competitive markets, people are more likely to buy from people they know and trust.
4. Serve first, sell later
While the days of hard sell are long gone, it doesn’t mean that selling itself is over; it’s just done differently.
Instead of pushing for sales, find ways to serve or help your audience by freely giving them information on your blog that you know will be useful to them.
You can do this by solving a problem, offering a taster product or service, or by showing them a time-saving or easier way to do something, based on your knowledge or experience.
5. Build your email list
Use your blog to help build your email list.
Get your blog visitors to sign up to your email list, by offering them something for free in return for their email addresses such as a relevant leaflet, case study, report or checklist.
As you create more content and develop your products and services, you can promote these products to your email list. And that will lead to sales.
6. Free or low-cost marketing
Your blog is your very own, low-cost marketing channel. You can set up and launch a blog for a relatively small sum of money, or for free.
Whether you’re adding your blog to an existing website or setting it up on its own, once it’s up and running, it can work for your business full-time.
7. Low-tech = easier set-up
It’s now much easier than it used to be to set up a blog with little or no technical knowledge.
There’s no need to invest initially in expensive gear or spend money replacing or upgrading equipment or technical tools.
And you don’t need to spend time trying to learn how to use and set up all this equipment.
If you set up your blog using WordPress for example, you can do so at a very low cost.
8. Contribute towards your personal branding and help you to grow your influence
In today’s crowded online world, it’s important to decide how you want to present yourself online and work towards that goal.
Do you plan to stand out, blend in with everyone else, quietly provide quality or be a thought leader?
Use your blog to help you achieve your personal branding goals and show who you are.
9. Re-use and re-purpose your written content
Blog content can be re-purposed for use in your other media – for example on your YouTube channel, or in your podcasts and on any other platforms you share your content.
By using the same content you have already written and re-shaping it for use elsewhere, you can save time and keep your messages consistent.
Even if you don’t have any other channels currently, you can still earmark your content for re-use on any channels you may launch in the future.
10. A space you own 100%
Your blog is the channel that is completely and utterly your own.
It isn’t reliant on third party algorithms or arbitrary rules that can change overnight (to your detriment) or lead to your content being removed without your permission.
11. Help your customers with their buying decisions
Your blog content can provide value, knowledge or education and you should think of each of your blog posts as an individual ambassador for your business.
While you won’t be doing any hard selling in your posts, you will be sending out subtle or low-key reminders by blogging consistently.
At the same time, you’ll be reminding your readers that your products and services are available, and when they decide to buy, they may decide to buy from you.
>>> Have any of these reasons convinced you to start your business blog and why?