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10 Beginners Tips for Business Blogging

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Recently someone asked on Quora what would be a better blogging platform: Blogger.com or WordPress? Frankly, I didn’t realize that people are still using Blogger.com for personal and business blogging. So, it came to my mind, there might be many beginners who are looking for some good tips on how to set up a business blog and how to profit from it.

Almost every major business has a blog and it uses blogging to promote its brand, to engage with audience and to draw targeted traffic from search engines and social networking websites. Still, blogging isn’t taken as seriously as a website, especially by the small business owners who haven’t had much time to keep themselves updated of latest trends on the Internet.

Maybe because initially when blogging began, it was an amateur activity. It was mostly journalling. Then started political blogs. Web design blogs. Internet marketing blogs.

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Business blogging began a lot later, though, even in early 2000’s, I was promoting my business (web design and development) by publishing lots of web design-related web pages on my website. There existed is no concept of “blogging”.

I don’t remember if Blogger.com came first or Typepad.com (powered by Movabletype). Then came WordPress. From the beginning itself you could install WordPress on your website and start publishing a blog. Ever since then I have been using WordPress although these days I routinely publish on Medium too.

Why business blogging is necessary to grow your business on the web

Long gone are the days when blogging was considered an idle person’s pastime. As I have written above, every serious business these days has a blog. Salesforce has a blog. New York Times has multiple blogs. Google has a blog. IBM has multiple blogs. Accenture has multiple blogs. Credible Content has a content writing and content marketing blog.

Every major business and publication on the web has a blog. Is it a fad, or is it a necessity? Or is it just an insatiable desire to reach out to your target audience?

Whether you are a beginner in the realm of business blogging or a seasoned professional, primarily there are 7 reasons why you might be publishing:

  1. A business blog increases content density on your website.
  2. As you cover various topics in your niche, your search engine rankings improve.
  3. You are constantly feeding Google with new content to crawl, index and rank.
  4. People regularly access your website or blog for the valuable content you provide.
  5. You constantly have something new and original to post on social networking websites.
  6. You give yourself and your employees opportunities to share their wisdom and expertise using your business blog.
  7. Eventually, you develop a platform that is independent and doesn’t have to rely on search engines and social networking websites for targeted traffic.

In 2013 New York Times published a negative review of Elon Musk’s Tesla Model’s S car. Elon Musk claimed that the review caused the company almost $100 million.

Musk used his own blog to respond. In the blog he was able to prove what New York Times published was “fake news” and the faults detailed in the New York Times article weren’t actually faults. Consequently New York Times drew lots of flak from Tesla car enthusiasts.

You may say that Elon Musk is one of the most powerful individuals in the world and hence, people would pay attention to his blog.

But the point is, his website has a blog and hence, he has a platform that could be used to counter the New York Times article, the same New York Times that has a well-established publishing platform. In the absence of blogging, Elon Musk would have had to depend on another news publication to carry out his counter argument.

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This is just one example of how you can use your business blogging platform to put across your own point in the time of bad PR, and many companies are already doing that.

But that’s just one aspect of business blogging.

Business blogging is good for search engine rankings and creating buzz on social media and social networking websites. As mentioned above, when you start writing about your niche topics, you begin to cover all the important keywords and search terms on your blog. Business blogging is the strongest tool in the hands of small businesses.

Since you are continuously publishing your blog, Google’s crawlers begin to crawl your website and blog frequently, even multiple times a day. This way, you not just have better search engine rankings, your latest content is also added to the Google index almost immediately.

Sometimes my blog posts and web pages begin to appear in search results within a minute of publishing.

Ready to publish your blog?

Know more about my blog content writing and consulting services.

Beginners tips for business blogging

  1. Be ready to make a long-term commitment: Business blogging, or rather, any sort of blogging, but especially business blogging, is a long-term commitment. You can’t have 10 blog posts and then be satisfied. Depending on your goals, you should publish a weekly blog post or a daily blog post. If you want to improve your search engine rankings and conversion rate within 3-4 months then I suggest you publish daily. Once you have started getting decent traffic, you can switch to alternative days and then, you can even go for once a week publishing schedule with high quality blog posts. But be ready for a long-term commitment.
  2. Decide on a blogging platform: My recommendation is always WordPress because when you use WordPress (WordPress.org), though, it has a learning curve in the beginning, you own your content. Everything is there on your website. Your own search engine rankings improve when you publish on your own blog. It is an uphill task to build an audience, but in the end, when you begin to get the results, you will realize that all that effort was worth it.
  3. In the beginning, you can also focus on Medium: This, I wouldn’t suggest for every other blogging platform, but Medium is a bit different. More than blogging, it’s a publishing platform. It has a thriving audience and even when you haven’t published many blog posts, depending on your quality, any of your blog posts can be picked up and suddenly, you will have thousands of people reading your blog post.
  4. Develop a unique voice: Your writing style for your business blogging should be conversational no matter how serious your niche is. Through your business blog, you are mostly having conversations with your audience. Write the way you speak. Since every person speaks differently, if you write the way you speak, your blog will carry a unique voice.
  5. Write as a human being: Even on a business blog something like “we do this” and “we do that” doesn’t sound very good and friendly. If you are a single person managing your business blog then it’s very easy to write as that person, but if you have multiple employees writing for your blog, you can create their profiles so that they write blog posts as themselves rather than as a company. This way your audience can relate to the people writing your blogs, and it will feel connected.
  6. Refrain from promoting your product or service on your business blog: This is because when people come to your blog, they are not interested in knowing about your product or service unless they want to read reviews. People are looking for information. They want their questions answered. If they have a problem, they want to solve that problem. It is best to create a list of questions and then create many blog posts providing answers to those questions. This will also give you an opportunity to use your keywords.
  7. Don’t over-use your keywords, but do use them: Business blogging is a great way of covering all your primary and longtail keywords, but don’t make it too obvious. People can easily make out if you are providing useful information or simply covering your keywords. And anyway, when you are constantly providing solutions and answers to questions, you will be automatically covering your niche keywords, so, you don’t have to walk an extra mile to use them.
  8. Learn to market your business blog content: There was a time when it was very easy to find websites and blogs. With millions of websites and blogs being created every week, there is a lot to be found. This is where content marketing comes in. You have to market your business blog. You have to make sure that people are able to find it. The best way to market your blog is to create and maintain interactive social media and social networking profiles. Whenever you publish a new blog post on your business blog, share the link using your social media and social networking platforms.
  9. Focus on networking and guest blogging to promote your business blog: This is something I need to do more but I don’t, but I’m gradually inching towards that. Constantly publishing your business blog on your own eventually begins to get you enough traction, but the real boost you will get by networking with other, already established publishers and industry leaders who would occasionally promote your links on their own timelines and blogs. You can also offer to write blog posts for other publications to expand your presence. You will also need quality backlinks to improve your search engine rankings.
  10. Let yourself loose sometimes: Although business blogging is primarily used to improve search engine rankings and engagement, especially by small business owners, you don’t always have to strictly stick to your topics. Sometimes also share interesting and amusing pieces of information with your blog audience. You can share a funny joke. You can share a GIF that makes people laugh. Or maybe there is a video that is going viral and you can publish it with your own take. Don’t dilute the focus of your blog by more regularly posting such material, but you can keep a 19-1 ratio of such posts with 19 of business-related content and 1 of simple entertainment.

Business blogging is a work of love, commitment and passion for your field. You can publish a business blog on an ongoing basis only when you have got lots to say.

If you think you won’t be able to commit the required effort and time on your business blog, it is better to collaborate with the content writer or a content writing service like Credible Content. My content writers routinely provide high-quality content to business blogs from all over the world.

Do let me know if you are looking for a business blog content writer for your business and I will gladly provide you the needed information.

With what frequency should you publish your blog

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People often wonder how many times they should post on their blogs in order to create a successful presence. There is no set rule. It depends on what you are actually trying to achieve through your blog. If your blog is new it is better to publish daily and sometimes (again, it depends on what you’re trying to achieve) even multiple times in a day because this may get your blog indexed by various search engines quickly. Once I published on a particular blog 4 blog posts every day and sometimes even 10 and its links started appearing on the first page within two weeks.

Quick publication can be counterproductive too if you write only on a particular topic because your readers may not have enough time to go through so many blog posts on a daily basis unless they’re solving some purpose. In such cases, you are fine with just one blog post every day.

Although publishing everyday may not be very crucial for your website/blog it can help you build your content fast and attain visibility, and consequently, recognition for publishing high-value content on a regular basis. People remember you better when they see or read something from you every day.

If you are simply gathering content under your website/blog you can post on alternative days or with whatever frequency that suits you (or your budget if you’re getting your blog posts written by a content writer). Some of my clients go with just one blog post every week and recently I started writing for a client who wants one blog post every second week.

Benefits of publishing regularly

There are many benefits of publishing blog posts regularly:

You build keyword-rich content faster

The more you write the more keywords and key phrases you cover with your content. As you keep on adding new blog posts to your blog the search engines gather and organize your links and then rank them according to their keyword relevance. Blogging everyday is the fastest way of getting good search engine rankings.

Better social media and networking exposure

Social media and networking is about rampant activity. Something is always going on and everybody is vying for attention, whether organizations or individuals. Hence it is very easy to forget names and brands. If you post every day it gives new fodder to your followers and friends. You encourage them to reach out to you and share their opinion. You constantly engage them and give them a reason to visit your blog daily.

It establishes you as an expert and an authority

I don’t mean to say that if you publish everyday and even if you’re publishing trash you become an authority in your field — no it doesn’t work this way. But it helps if you’re content is of high-value and frequent. Visit Seth Godin’s blog and you will notice that he gives remarkable advise without missing even a single day. Although I haven’t personally checked it people say that he posts even on Christmas. He is known for his great advice and he is also known in the blogging world for not missing even a single day of posting. Besides, sharing knowledge makes you more knowledgeable too as each time you publish something related to your profession you need to study and come up with valuable, usable information.

Aside from these benefits, again, it depends on what you are trying to gain through your blog. More than frequency what matters is quality. Even if you publish one blog post every month make sure that it is high-quality because eventually that is what gets you recognition from people as well as search engines.

Creating blog posts that really make an impact

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Yesterday I talked about why your business needs a blog, so today, let’s briefly talk about creating blog posts that produce real results. Now what do we mean by “real results”. For that you gotta figure out why you blog.

Are you simply blogging to improve your search engine rankings? Although there is nothing wrong in that, if you are blogging simply for SEO, you are missing the whole point of blogging. Blogging is a branding tool, it’s a communication means, SEO happens – a good thing though – as a byproduct. If you publish blog posts that can really help your visitors (they should return enriched) then you are automatically improving your search engine rankings.

Enough with the SEO gripe; if you want to create effective and impactful blog posts, there are two ways of achieving that:

  • Following the herd
  • Evolving your own, distinct style

Both these methods work. For instance, these days lots of blog posts are created in a list style, something like

  • 5 sure shot ways of harassing your neighbors
  • 10 social skills you shouldn’t try in public
  • 55 jQuery plugins to totally destroy your website
  • 7 psychopathic tendencies that make your baby adorable

…you get the drift.

These lists abound on the Internet, and they’re really great in terms of collating great information and presenting it without having to write well. I mean, you don’t need to stretch your writing skills much if you’re creating monosyllabic bullets.

Evolving your own style is difficult, but it’s a better way of embarking upon your blogventure. It gives you your own voice and renders you a unique personality.

Other than these, there are standard ways that help you create impactful blog posts:

Give enough time to a new idea

Stop having blog-post-publishing dreams as soon as you hit upon your great 21st century idea. Jot down the notes and prepare a draft. I don’t mean you should take hours preparing posts that can be prepared in 20 minutes, but if there is an idea that warrants some prolonged thinking, give it some time, even a few days. Remember that it’s not important how many posts you publish, but what’s the quality of those posts.

Create titles that draw attention

By reading your title your prospective reader should be able to make out precisely what you offer in your latest blog post. Learn from the “screaming” newspaper headlines. They are created so that you immediately grab the copy and start reading the news.

Your readers may come across your blog post title anywhere: on your blog, on a search engine result page, on another website or blog, or on a social media bookmarking or networking website. A dull, uninspiring headline is never going to make them click the link. But don’t mislead your readers; if your title offers chocolates, don’t give sugarcanes in the actual post.

Stick to a single topic

Handling a single subject has many benefits:

  • It paves way for multiple blog posts
  • One concept is easier to understand and remember
  • It’s less confusing
  • It’s more focused
  • You can keep coming back to it to add more value
  • It’s easier for your readers to save or bookmark your link under appropriate categories and tags

Offer a workable solution

Avoid offering probabilities, as anybody can do that. Offer solid solutions in your blog posts. When a reader leaves your blog, he or she should feel that, yes, the world is a bit better after reading your blog post. Providing solid solutions also encourages people to

  • Bookmark your link
  • Promote it on social media and networking websites
  • Link to your blog post from their website, blogs and newsletters

Ask for opinion

Blowing your own horn after a while tends to get boring. There needs to be some involvement and engagement. Make your readers an active part of the thought process. Ask for opinion. Nudge them for a feedback. Question them, probe them, you can even incite them. Your every blog post should try to trigger a reaction.

OK, I have got only this much time for today’s post. Got some ideas for creating great blog posts? Share them in the comment section and I’ll include them here with a link back to your website or blog.