Does your small business website have a blog on it? You could be missing out on a huge opportunity if it doesn’t.
Studies have shown that small business websites that have blogs attached to them receive about 55 percent more traffic every month than those without blogs. That should be reason enough for you to get a blog for your small business website up and running right now.
There are also lots of other benefits of blogging that you’ll get to enjoy when you start a blog on your small business website.
Check out 7 of the biggest benefits of blogging for small businesses below.
1. Improves Your Website’s SEO
When people search for the products or services that your small business sells on Google, does your website pop up anywhere on the first page of search results?
If it doesn’t, this means you need to spend time improving the search engine optimization, or SEO, of your site. You need to show Google that your site has the information that people are looking for on it so that Google moves your site up closer to the top of search results.
There are many ways to improve your website’s SEO. But jumpstarting a blog is arguably the simplest way to do it. It’ll allow you to put together blogs that feature certain keywords that will appeal to your customer base.
2. Establishes Your Expertise in Your Industry
In order to convince people to purchase products or services from your small business, you need to build up a certain amount of trust with them. They need to be able to trust that you know what you’re talking about when it comes to your industry.
What better way to show off all that you know than by creating a blog? A blog will give you an opportunity to let the world know that you’re an established authority within your space.
Let’s say, for example, that you run a tow truck company. Before people to hire you to tow a car for them, they’re going to want to know more about what your company brings to the table.
One way they’ll find this out is by checking your online reviews to see what your customers have had to say about you over the years. But they’ll also do it by browsing through your blog to get a better sense of what your company is all about.
When they see that you have a blog filled with all kinds of useful information on towing, they’ll be more likely to trust you to perform a service for them.
3. Showcases Your Products or Services
The main part of your small business website might already contain a lot of valuable information on your products and services. But a blog will allow you to take things a step further while showcasing them.
For instance, the main part of your site might have product information on the auto parts that your company sells. People can read through product descriptions to see what they’ll be getting when they buy a part from you.
But on your blog, you can go more in-depth while discussing auto parts. You can create blogs with titles like “Why You Should Buy New Auto Parts Instead of Used Ones” and “5 Ways to Tell If It’s Time to Buy New Tires” to motivate your customers to purchase products or services from you.
4. Creates Connections With Customers
As a small business owner, one of your many goals should be to do whatever it takes to connect with your current and potential customers. Creating connections with people will develop loyalty.
By launching a blog, you’ll give customers a place to gather and read content related to your business. You’ll also give them an opportunity to leave feedback under each of your blogs for your business.
5. Provides You With Social Media Content
In 2019, it’s almost impossible to run a successful small business in the U.S. without relying on social media to some degree. You need to have Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts set up, and you need to update them every day.
One of the best social media marketing tips that you’ll ever get is that you shouldn’t just update social media accounts with information on the sales you’re holding or the new products that arrived yesterday.
You should update them with things that will have a chance of resonating with the people in your community.
When you have blog content going up on your site at least a few times a week, you’ll be able to link to it on your social media sites to attract attention for your business.
People will appreciate you supplying them with actual content as opposed to social media posts that are blatant attempts at making sales.
6. Allows You to Network With Other Businesses
As we mentioned earlier, building a blog on your small business website can improve your site’s SEO in dramatic ways. But you need to remember that you’re going to have to do more than just put blogs together.
Those blogs need to feature the right keywords in their headlines to make an impact as far as SEO is concerned. They also need to include those same keywords in your content. And you need to put in links to other trusted sites and blogs in your posts as well and, ideally, get them to link back to you.
Backlinks are an essential part of any solid SEO strategy. And to get them, you’ll need to network with other businesses and convince them that your content is worth linking to. This will create new relationships with other businesses and make you a stronger part of your community.
7. Keeps People Coming Back to Your Website
If you don’t have a blog on your site, what incentive do customers have to come back to it?
Most of the other content on your site is going to stay the same over the course of many months. But a blog can keep your site fresh and encourage people to come back, again and again, to see what’s new with your business.
Use the Benefits of Blogging to Your Advantage
As you can see, it makes all the sense in the world for your small business website to have a blog on it. There are too many benefits of blogging to ignore.
Create your own blog today and start updating it early and often. You’ll get a great response from your customers when you do it, and you’ll bring in new business almost right away.
Take a look at our blog to see some of the reasons why your website might be having a tough time generating traffic.