8 Undeniable Benefits Of Blogging For Business
I will make a bold claim… When done right, your blog will have the Axe effect.
Do you remember the controversial advertisement by Axe?
If you haven’t heard about the Axe effect, it is a term coined by the marketers of Axe deodorant. It claims to draw women in hordes to any male who has sprayed himself liberally with the Axe deodorant.
Okay, the “Axe Effect” is an exaggerated claim, but the benefits of blogging for business are undeniable. With a well thought out content strategy, your business blog can attract a lot of traffic to your website consistently. The keyword being consistently.
Here are some interesting data points for you skeptics who need to see numbers to believe — I fall in that category too!
Blogging stats for the data lovers
55% of marketers say blog content creation is their top inbound marketing priority. (HubSpot, 2018)
One in ten blog posts is compounding, meaning organic search increases their traffic over time. (HubSpot, 2016)
Marketers who prioritize blogging efforts are 13x more likely to see positive ROI. (HubSpot, 2019)
Over ¾ of internet users say they read blogs regularly. (Quoracreative, 2019)
66% of marketers surveyed used blogs in their social media content. (Social Media Examiner, 2019)
43% of B2B marketers say blogging is their most important type of content. (Social Marketing Industry Report, 2017)
What is Business blogging?
A business blog is a digital property where high-quality information is published as blog posts. A business blog is a brand’s owned media. Brands publish high-quality content to show up in search engine results and to increase brand awareness. Brands with successful blogs get most of their traffic organically.
What are the benefits of blogging for business?
Data doesn’t lie, but it doesn’t always tell you the entire story, so let’s take a detailed look at the blogging benefits.
Good old organic traffic through Search Engine Optimization
A blog is one of the best, if not the best, way to get free traffic to your site. I admit, it’s not the fastest way to drive traffic to your site, but in contrast to paid search marketing, organic traffic does not dry up the minute you stop pumping money into it. With SEO editing, you can create content that ranks for your keywords.
SEO is very similar to the Shaolin training that you see in the movies. You’ve to endure a lot of hardship before you see any results. But all those broken bones, blood, sweat, and tears will be worth it when you finally build up that flurry of steady traffic to your site. You can’t write one or two blog posts and expect results. In fact, even hundreds of blog posts won’t do you any good unless you have a reason for each one. You need quality blog posts and a solid content strategy to create relevant content for your target audience.
Check out my Frase vs MarketMuse vs Surfer SEO comparison to learn
more about tools that can help you create top-quality content.
Google has received nearly 2.3 trillion searches this year. Even a small slice of that traffic can transform your business, right?
Building trust and meaningful relationships with Existing And New Customers
A business blog is the most effective way to connect with your current and future customers.
If your potential customers find answers to their burning questions through your blog post, then you’ve already started building trust, which is the foundation for any successful business relationship.
Many companies, like Hootsuite or Ahrefs, publish a lot of training material for their existing customers, teaching them how to use their product. This is an excellent strategy to create super fans who will act as your brand ambassadors.
Establish Your Business As An Industry Thought Leader
One excellent example of in the B2B space is EY. The thought leadership articles and thought-provoking material that they publish has positioned them as an innovator and leader in their category.
Another example is HubSpot, they have become the go-to resource for most marketers and small businesses. HubSpot has blog posts and ranks among the top 5 for almost all the major marketing keywords.
Thought leadership is not restricted to just B2B businesses; people like Neil Patel, Brian Dean, and many others have successfully used blogging to position themselves as an authority in their space.
Showcase Your Brand’s personality
Ever wonder why we are drawn to some people immediately, while we are put-off by others, even though they have done nothing to offend us?
The answer is their personality.
Your blog is an excellent medium to showcase your brands’ personality.
The viral effect
Ah, the coveted but elusive phenomenon, that is still a mystery. An excellent piece of shareable content supported by the right tools can improve the chances of your content going viral. In fact, there are studies conducted to develop a process for creating viral content. There is no magic formula for creating viral content, but you can increase your chances by creating shareable content — that’s post for another day.
Generate Leads
Once your customer trusts your brand, the likelihood of converting them as a customer is higher. Because of the innate need for reciprocity in human nature, customers tend to choose a brand that has already provided them with value, over a brand that is always trying to sell them products.
Blogs also help to educate your customers, making the conversion much more comfortable because they are aware of their problem and appreciate your solution.
Your own knowledge base
Your blog will eventually turn into a high-value knowledge base that your employees can always turn to if they have current customers asking for a specific process or guidance on implementing the tool.
Pro tip: Client FAQs are a gold mine of compelling blog topics.
Best way to identify content that resonates with your audience
How would you like to have a fool-proof method to pick out winning campaigns? If you said ‘yes,’ then your business blog is your magic tool. It’s the best way to identify your winning campaign. Push out the campaign theme through your blogs and see which message resonates the most with your audience. More often than not, this would be your trump card. Now that you’ve tested the water, you can confidently invest money in your campaign. As marketers, we can’t always work in a zero-risk environment, but it doesn’t hurt to minimize the risk by taking calculated chances.
Considering all the benefits of blogging for business, I think every brand should maintain a high-quality business blog. You can always outsource this effort if you want to scale fast and don’t want to invest your time creating blog articles.
Feel free to drop me a line if you’re a small business or solopreneur looking to create a content marketing strategy or a digital marketing playbook before you outsource your content creation process.
Vivek Mathew
(aka The Mindful Marketer, aka the guy who rocks a pink shirt 😄)
I’m a content consultant who helps small businesses become iconic brands by clarifying their brand message and creating strategic content. I’ve worked with brands like EY, Natwest, and some early-stage startups like Vivartah.
Click the button below and book a call with me.