Why Starting A Blog In 2018 Could Be Your Path To Success
Struggling to make an impact on the business world? We get it. Many SMEs toil in obscurity and fail to crack the big time through no lack of trying. As 2018 begins, consider changing your strategy and introducing a blog to your business website. It can do absolutely no harm, and in many instances, it paves the path to success.
Become an authority
Blogging is a trial and error process that requires persistence. But so long as you’ve got an opinion on a niche you own, it’s the perfect way to shape yourself as a thought leader. Good blogs give things away for free: ideas, tips, tricks, and they solve real-world business problems. Don’t use it to flog your wares straight away. Rather build up trust in your audience first.
Post to Linkedin
Since you’ll be writing about business, LinkedIn is a good place to publicize your content. In the unlikely event you don’t yet have a profile, set one up in minutes and make use of the site’s handy blogging portal. You’ll want to get people interested in your work and ultimately entice them to your site, so think of catchy stories that have real-world appeal, and leave a teaser on LinkedIn to drum up interest.
Track who’s visiting
Through the power of Google Analytics, you can intimately track how many people are reading your work, and where they’re reading it from. In effect, this gives you a valuable snapshot of where the market is concentrated in the US and around the world. And since Google Analytics will also show you how long people are reading your articles for, you can concentrate on future topics that people find interesting.
Build Your Network
Blogging is an opportunity to collaborate with influencers who are influential in related fields. This is an excellent relationship-building strategy, one that is sure to broaden your network.
Improve your SEO
More than ever, Google is looking to reward websites that post quality content on a daily basis. If your blog becomes popular, you’ll find yourself skyrocketing to the top of Google’s search engine for words associated with your business. A top tip is to reach out to high authority websites that might be interested in your writing. Ask them to post about you and reward them with the same favor in return. If successful, you’ll see incremental improvements in your Google ranking.
Learn from the best
Bloggers like Neil Patel (digital media marketing), Seth Godin (business) and Sean Ogle (entrepreneurship) all own a specific niche of the market. See what they do well, but remember: originality is everything in the blogging world, so be sure to bring in your own voice. (As an aside, many of the best blogs are fronted by individuals rather than businesses. This lends the work a more personal appeal, and is one strategy you could try.)
Upsell slowly
Once you’ve built a name for yourself, try weaving in sales techniques, like pointing out areas in which your business can solve common day-to-day problems, or inviting people to sign up for a mailing list, where you give away subscriber-only content for free but sell on top of it. If you try to flog your product across the pages of your blog, you’ll turn people away. But if you do it smartly, you’ll not only reap all the other benefits of blogging, but make a tidy profit from it as well.
