Blogging For Business Success

Blogging is dead, or at least that is what someone said to me and honestly as a dyslexic I wish that were the case.

Being dyslexic is not my only challenge when blogging; I also struggle with finding the time. I want my articles and blog posts to be interesting, to show personality and most importantly, to be useful. I write in Word, hoping any dyslexic mistakes are highlighted, and then I check the post to see if my blogging efforts match the below:

• Six hundred plus words
• Tells a story
• Adds value and informs
• Uses keywords and phrases coherently
• Content is not spamming for SEO reach

Blogging tracks and increases SEO, which is why I am writing another blog post; this time, I decided to remove some of the myths and explain that I am writing a blog around the word ‘Blogging’.

As I write this, the post is tracking at 80/100. As soon as I add another Blogging post, it edges to 83. I can continue to play around with my text, images, and links to see if I can improve this ranking. To be honest, I am not going to. An SEO ranking of 83/100 is great, and I am not seeking perfection.

Blogging is full of Surprises

This is not the blog I was going to write, that one I had planned is lost on the hard drive. I checked the recycle bin, all my files, I cannot find it on my PC.

I am disappointed for two reasons; I must start again, and I had carefully crafted my words to works around the key phrase ‘video content.’ I spent hours researching, editing the blog making sure the words and sentences where coherent, made sense, told a story and added value without spamming.

You Must Find Time For Blogging

The best way to improve your business profile is to invest in search engine optimization. You can pay for adverts, before you do, ask yourself; have you done enough with your organic marketing? Just like adding captions on your video, writing a blog ought to be part of your business marketing strategy, it must use your key phrase and you write for SEO.

I was talking this week to someone who does not blog, when I asked why not, their answer was time. As an SMB/SME time will always be pressing, this is where you can consider outsourcing freeing up your time to focus on what you like to do, find someone who loves blogging and get them to write for you.

Think of blogging as part of your business marketing pillars, whilst I was learning WordPress under the guidance of Chaela Hall from Ocho Works she talked about architecture. This is exactly what your blog is part of. It is a pillar of your marketing content helping the bots to understand you and your business. How you serve adding another layer of paint and colour towards creating a brand personality.

Organic Marketing is Free

What I love about organic marketing is it is free; with the way we all purchase today businesses need to show how they serve and social selling for business is different to how you would promote yourself on social media.

Your Blog is Cake and Coffee Time

I love watching businesses embrace this powerful tool and writing a blog is part of the bigger picture of organic business marketing.

I have said before that social media is your shop front, your website is a department store, and your blog is the newspaper in the coffee shop. I do not know about you; I do know when I go shopping, I get bored, and I want to drink a cup of coffee and eat cake.

Whilst eating my cake and drinking my coffee I will surf on my phone and read a blog. Now this is where mobile optimization is important, your content must work across all devices.

Writing a blog takes time, once written it is evergreen content you can repeatedly share across social platforms. You can turn you blog into a video diary, post quotes on social media and add them to your presentations. The time to write a blog is an investment and that effort will pay off for you as your customer will be reading and watching as they get to know you online.

When you share your blog from your website to social media using a link you create a back link this in turn gets the bots to look at what and who you are, and they start to crunch numbers. The real magic happens when someone clicks the link, The bots get excited, and your blog takes on a life of its own. I like to think of crawling bots as Aubrey II (Twoey) from ‘Little Shop of Horrors’ singing ‘Feed Me Seymour’. The bots want your content, they devour your content, and your content makes them happy.

Blogging and Vlogging Are a Choice

I chose to write a blog and create video vlogs. When I wrote my first article I panicked, I posted it on LinkedIn and eventually added it to my website. I write my content with SEO in mind and it has become second nature.

Every Blog post is launched on my website , I love this, it gives me days of editing and tidy and searching for dyslexic mistakes. I check it on mobile and desktop and then when I am happy I share it to my social media.

At the bottom of the post I add in one or two links, for this one I am going with two, one to my blog home page and the other to my YouTube channel. This keeps the bots fed with new content, The bots are happy and they keep coming back for more data to consume.

My business journey has been a learning curve very much like my life. I have failed, floundered, succeeded, and cried. I have listened to the wrong people, lost my confidence, lost friends, made friends and learnt that my time is important.

When you take the plunge and work with me, I will be there supporting you to find your brand voice, helping you to use SEO as part of your organic marketing and empowering you and your team with the knowledge I have gained.

Get in touch to find out more.