Still asking what is the purpose of a blog? Seriously, you need to stop right there and go create one. There are lots of benefits to starting a blog, so much so that not having one today is like leaving money on the table.
A blog can be an excellent tool for promoting your business, establishing thought leadership, and increasing traffic to your website. It’s also a source of passive income if you rely on your blog as a way of making money.
But what do all these mean? Let’s take a look at the benefits of blogging in more detail below.
But first,
What is a Business blog?
A business blog is a type of website that provides commentary and content related to a particular industry or niche. Business blogs can be used to establish authority and topical relevance in an industry, as well as share news, product updates, and opinions on a given topic.
Business blogs often publish articles that are written by blog owners and staff writers, but they also allow guest bloggers to contribute content on an occasional basis.
Having guest bloggers contribute to your blog not only helps you cover more advanced topics where your or your staff’s expertise is limited, but it also helps present your digital experience as rich, and more dynamic to your customers.
What is the Purpose of a Blog?
Blogs exist to serve a variety of purposes:
1) Build credibility with powerful content and an interesting storytelling approach
Credibility is the foundation of your blog. If you’re not credible, no one will care what you have to say. If you are in a field that is super competitive, but highly profitable, then you can start a blog with the sole purpose of building credibility.
There are some basic steps that can help you build credibility over time:
If you’re not sure how to create credible content, here are some tips:
- Use statistics and figures when possible (in the form of charts or graphics)
- Provide real-life examples that your audience can relate to
- Back up claims with evidence from research studies, surveys, or case studies
- Provide a list of resources for more information (to ensure people can find more information if they want it)
- Create content that is easy to digest and understand
- Providing quality content consistently
- Being authentic and transparent in everything you do on your blog (including storytelling)
You can also use your blog to enhance credibility by working with subject matter experts (Semrush does this by encouraging SEO gurus to contribute to their Digital Marketing blog)
Also, don’t forget the basics of credible content such as using relevant statistics, backing up content with examples, and doing detailed case studies.
Want to master storytelling?
Take this short 2-hour course gives you all the gists about stories that sell so you don’t have to spend years figuring it out on your own.
2) Help users understand your offerings
Blog posts can be used to explain products, services, and processes. If you have a product that is not so easy to use, you can use your blog to educate users by publishing detailed tutorials on and around it.
Blog posts are also great for answering frequently asked questions (FAQs) about your products or services.
A third way that blogs can help users understand your offerings is by showing examples of how they work so anyone who sees them knows exactly what they need as well as why they need it!
SaaS products do this by showcasing on their blogs what others have built or been able to accomplish using their tools.
To do this correctly, you need a blog strategy.
This mini-course will help you create a proven process when it comes to keyword research, competitor research, cluster topics, blog promotion, etc.
3) Promote a business
A blog is a great way to promote your business. Blogging builds trust with your customers and helps you build a relationship with them.
If you want to reach out to more people, blogging is an effective way of doing so.
Since blogs are so accessible, they make it easy for readers to share content on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter which can lead to increased traffic for your website in addition to building up an audience that may become loyal customers over time!
To promote a business with your blog, you need to:
- Publish targeted content that is genuinely helpful, and weave in your products and services. You can do this by including call-to-actions at the end of your posts, or by referencing them throughout your articles.
- Carefully select the topics that you meet. Spread your content across the three stages of the sales funnel: Top of the funnel (TOFU) — Awareness stage, Middle of the Funnel( MOFU) — Consideration stage, Bottom of the funnel (BOFU) — Decision stage
- Promote your content through strategies such as repurposing to other channels, sharing on social media with a powerful scheduler like Publer, and emailing your list.
As a way to promote your business, blogging can be a powerful strategy that can bring in qualified prospects, turn them into leads and later even convert them to paying customers.
Here are the tools for starting a blog:
4) As a passive income source
For many bloggers, blogs are their main source of income, through monetization models such as display ads and affiliate marketing.
So, yes, starting a blog as a primary way to make money is a legitimate purpose. It’s business.
While it takes some time to build sustainable traffic channels such as SEO and email lists, it’s possible to turn blogging into a passive income stream after a few hundred of high-quality content, is posted, optimized, and updated.
4) Foster brand awareness
Blogging is a great way to build brand awareness. This means that you’re building an audience who cares about your product or service and will be more likely to purchase it in the future. There are several ways to do this:
- Create content that is valuable and informative for your readership. If people enjoy reading what you have to say, then they’ll return for more down the road.
- Encourage reader participation through polls, comments, and other engagement tools. This will make people feel like they’re part of something bigger than just reading articles online
6) Promote affiliate offers
Affiliate marketing is a popular way to make money online. The affiliate program pays you a commission for driving traffic to their website. The more traffic you drive, the more money you can make.
Affiliate programs are easy to set up and some offer free websites, banners, and other tools so that you don’t have to spend any money on a website or marketing costs in order to get started making money through your blog immediately!
7) Generate leads for your business
Businesses use blogs to generate leads for their business and build a community of followers, all the time.
You do this by publishing exceptional content, and then offering relevant gated content that they will need to provide their email addresses to gain access. Depending on the nature of your business, this can be a free ebook, a white paper, a video, an email course, or any other type of lead magnet.
This then allows your business to follow up with those visitors later on in order to sell more products or services.
8) Demonstrate Thought Leadership
The ability to influence and shape the thoughts of others in your field is known as thought leadership.
Blogging allows you to share your ideas and opinions with your audience, which can be a great way to demonstrate this. For example, if you’re an expert in customer service, you could write blog posts on topics like best practices for customer service agents or customer service mistakes to avoid.
9) Improve the freshness of your website
Keeping your site fresh will help you stay on top of the latest trends in your industry, which is something that can be very helpful for keeping your business relevant to readers.
Freshness also makes it easier for search engines to find your content, as it increases the frequency at which search engines like Google and Bing crawl your website.
10) Nurture a community
It’s not enough to simply create content that provides value for your readers. You also need to cultivate a community around that content by encouraging feedback from other experts and enthusiasts in the same field, while engaging with them on social media channels such as Facebook or Twitter. This will help you build loyal readers who will continue coming back for more of your work.
A well-established community can serve many purposes:
- It can be used as a sounding board for new ideas and products (this is especially helpful if you are launching something new).
- It can provide feedback on previous posts (including questions about past topics) which may lead to even bigger discussions around current events going on within industry circles right now…especially if those events involve important topics related to practices in your industry.
11) Boost SEO
Blogging can also help your internal pages rank higher on search engines.
By producing highly informative content, you increase the chances of others organically linking to your posts. This boosts your rankings on SERPs.
Blogging also keeps your website fresh and current. New content means new keywords that Google (and other search engines) can see as relevant to their users’ searches.
This increases the likelihood that they will show up in search results when potential customers are looking for answers to questions related to these topics!
Also note that readers are more likely to discover your website through specific search queries that can only be covered through blog posts, and not your product pages. On landing your posts, they can then explore your other pages, shop around and decide if they want to stick around.
12) Establish authority and topical relevance in an industry
A blog can help establish your authority in the industry and build credibility in your field. It will showcase your expertise, and help you gain the trust of readers.
This can be accomplished by showing that you understand their problems—and better yet, how to solve them.
13) Blogging helps you assert your brand voice
A blog can help your brand stand out from your competitors in many ways: the way it’s structured; how you write headings; how you word content; and even the topics that you intentionally choose to cover.
Every post published on your page will solidify its brand voice, and positioning in the industry and ultimately reflect on your general approach to branding.
14) Help gain website activity and boost visibility
People are more likely to share a blog post than a static homepage, so it’s an effective way to get your site out there. Plus, you can encourage engagement by adding a comment section and diligently responding genuinely to comments that people leave on your posts.
How not to get blogging wrong
- Don’t ignore your readers. When it comes to blogging, your readers come first. Take time to research and understand your target audience so you can better serve them with relevant content that speaks directly to their needs and interests.
- Don’t blog without a clear business purpose. This can include driving traffic to other pages on your site (such as product pages), increasing sales of physical goods or services, or optimizing conversions.
- Don’t underestimate the power of keyword research — either through Google Keyword Planner or paid tools like SEMrush.
What a blog does not do
A blog is not a replacement for social media: It is not a place to post every day about what you had for lunch, the latest thing your cat did, or who was seen at the movie theater last night. People come to your blog because they want information. Give them that, and perhaps more.
A blog is also not a replacement for paid advertising: Blogging takes time to pay off, but paid advertising can be profitable for every campaign that you run. So, while you wait for SEO to ‘grow on you,’ don’t be afraid to try paid ads to promote your business. This program on Fiverr learn will teach you how to use Facebook Ads to promote a business while making profits
Should I create a blog?
Blogging is a great way to build your brand and attract new customers. It can also help you get more traffic to your website, which can lead to more leads. So yes, I highly recommend starting a blog.
But if blogging isn’t right for you or your business, there are other ways to promote a business that you can weave into your overall marketing strategy.
