Blogging is an essential part of an overall content marketing strategy. Once you start strengthening your brand’s identity with quality content, you can expect to see more link acquisitions and conversions, which will lead to increased business.
Blogs allow you and your brand to showcase what your already know, and what you work with on a day-to-day basis: information about your particular niche market product or service.
You may have established your brand with customers offline. Bringing those same conversations online can help build that same authority on the web. Converting your knowledge into a company blog will increase awareness of your brand and establish you as an expert in your field.
The future of search engines
A few years ago, a major search engine confirmed that information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification.
What does this mean? Well, it’s great news for bloggers because it makes it easier to become an authority just by blogging about what you know best – your products and services! Information that has a clear author will be ranked higher, and therefore more likely to get clicks.
Gone are the days of SEO keyword stuffing in meta-tags, or other kinds of tricks to make your website appear higher in rankings. Search engines are looking for original, quality content that ranks well with online profiles and social authority.
Search engines are increasingly tying rankings to the trust, credibility and authority established by online profiles.
Who should blog
If your brand showcases several experts in different areas of B2B or product knowledge, you could get more than one person involved in the blogging project. You can do this by hosting a blog under your brand name and creating various contributor or author profiles for each blogger.
What to blog about
The important thing is to blog about what you know, what you are best at. So if that’s advising a client on a particular widget and all the bells and whistles of that widget, then write about that.
You may have to do research or link to other blogs providing sources or background knowledge about your subject. That’s fine, just make sure to give credit where credit is due.
After all, if someone referenced your blog, you would want them to link to you, right? This is called link building, and it’s part of the algorithm search engines use to rank websites. In addition, you’ll see increased traffic from visitors clicking the link in the blog.
It’s all about your audience
Your customers and prospects will benefit from reading the information you provide on your blog. Keeping a company or industry blog helps build trust in your brand. The more consistent and well versed the discussion, the better impression you will make as a leader in your field.
For example, if you sell to businesses, you could post well-researched articles about your industry and the specific services your firm provides. If you are in retail, blogging about products sends clear signals to customers that you’re the source for any information regarding products they’re interested in. Either way, it’s all about getting the information to the reader in the most streamlined and effective way possible.
In conclusion
A blog can be the catalyst for forming new customer relationships, just by establishing authority on the subject and providing useful information to your visitors. Ultimately, establishing a blog sets you ahead of the competition, optimizing your website for search engine rankings, links, and new inquiries for your products or services.