The purpose of blogging is to help your clients or potential clients solve their problems while connecting them with you/your business, and your community.
Why Blog?
With blogging you can share your personality and your business through custom content, opinions, and points of interest on a host of topics. Blogging promotes your business, establishes you as a subject matter authority, helps customers get to know you, and warms up prospects by offering them useful information. With ever increasing enforced privacy, it is more important than ever to communicate regularly with your past, present, and future clients; blogs offer a shortcut to communicating directly and regularly with your existing customers.
Blogs that include a call to action or CTA allow new readers to subscribe to your business to build your client base.
In short, blogging can be as effective or more effective at promoting your business than advertising. However, there are a few things to keep in mind when crafting your message for the web.
SEO is Critical
Gone are the days of slapping up an article stuffed with keywords for the sake of having something with SEO on your website. Readers are discerning and don't want to waste their time sifting through detritus to find a kernel of knowledge. They want to be educated, served and engaged. The expectation is for well-written and researched custom content blog posts delivered from your perspective and area of expertise.
Quality content is a great starting place, but it isn't enough. Search engine optimization (SEO) is critical to make your articles and website visible to people searching by keywords associated with your product or service. If your business sells chocolate – you need to research which keywords put your website at the top of search engine results so that people choose your product first over the 150 thousand others available. If you're thinking of keyword stuffing, just don't. Stuffing content with keywords means you have focused on the SEO results and not the reader, which drops the quality of your content and drives readers away. Search engines are also discerning and condemn the practice of keyword stuffing. Filling content with needless keywords can lead to a search penalty and will drop your ratings. Instead, start with quality content and use keywords organically within the content.
Time is money, and if it takes you three hours per blog post or writing is not your thing, consider outsourcing to a writer who can capture your voice and tone.
How to Monetize Your Blog
If you're thinking – "for all that effort, shouldn't a blog post be making me money?" You're right; it should.
Always Include a Call to Action (CTA)
After creating search engine optimized quality content, the next step in monetizing your blog is to include a strong call to action or CTA. A CTA leads your readers to a specific action, such as subscribing to your blog, downloading a report or whitepaper, or filling out a landing page form. Subscribing captures the reader's contact information for your list.
Once you have a list, it is helpful to segment it based on where the customers are in your lifecycle and what tailored content is more relevant to them. Segmenting will help you create CTAs specific to the customer's entry point in the cycle, which will increase your conversion rates. For example, a visitor CTA; "get my free guide now," a lead CTA; "start my free trial now," and an existing customer CTA; "get my download now." Specific CTA's move your visitor, lead, or customer to the next logical step in their buying process.
There is a variety of CTAs you can include in your blog post; some are placed at the end to increase conversion, others are included in the blog text or are linked to additional blog content, and some are placed on the side of the blog. The action you want the visitor to take will determine where the CTA is placed. Additionally, it's good practice to change the wording in your offers to keep things fresh over time. The fundamental CTAs are:
● Social Media CTAs
Effective use of a CTA is to connect your business with social media. If someone likes your business and your content, they'll probably be interested in future content. Your business can post content on social media that readers can follow by creating a CTA in each social media channel. By simply clicking a button, they can follow you.
● Blog Subscriptions CTAs
If readers like your blog posts, they can subscribe to your posts by email, alerting them when you post new content. By filling out a simple form with a name/email address, visitors are added to your subscriber base.
● Comment CTAs
Many blogs encourage their readers to share their thoughts and opinions on their articles. Your CTA can say, "share your thoughts about this blog," or you can ask them a question on a specific topic from your blog. A comment CTA encourages reader interaction and nurtures the relationship.
● In-Line CTAs
A call to action doesn't have to be a button; it can also be as simple as a link within your article that provides additional information on a specific topic. The link serves the same purpose as a button by directing people to act.
● Sidebar CTAs
These sidebars are great if you have content relevant to your company that is not crucial to your blog post's content. The purpose of sidebar CTAs is to drive your company goals and be seen by anyone viewing the site, not necessarily searching for a blog.
Analysis
Metrics allow you to analyze blog posts and individual pages to see who and how visitors engage with your content. Analytics also provides insights on your sources of website traffic, your search engine optimization, and your website's overall performance. BRENT's structured system provides a granular view of the content-based interactions, including views, submissions, new contacts, customers, average bounce rate, average time on page, exit rate, and entrances. These metrics give your accurate measurements on how your blog post performs, who is engaging, where they're from. These metrics help you to identify gaps and make improvements.
Tip
Two proven techniques to capitalize on the knowledge gained from your highly engaged readers;
● reach out by phone, email, or FedEx to build the connection
● print a summary of your weekly blogs with your blog's anchor image, and send by email or FedEx either once a week, twice a month, or once a month. The higher up the customer is on the pyramid, the more frequent the interaction.
Private Library
Over time, you will have amassed a large collection of blog posts which can be beneficial ongoing information for both you and your customers. Think of these blog posts as your private lending library. You bought or earned the knowledge, you are storing it, and you decide who has access. Like a library, readers appreciate an efficient filing system that makes their search simple and fast. A search field on your website gives readers the option to find specific topics or pages quickly. The search bar encourages your readers to return to your website when they are seeking future information. A positive user experience lends itself to return visits.
Put your knowledge and experience to work in blogs that build relationships, generate leads, and close sales. BRENT's structured system can access keywords through SEO, monetize your blog, segment your CTAs, and include a field search function to make your library of blogs accessible to your new and returning customers.
We can help you get started. Click below to set up a time to chat.
