The new word of mouth online is the blog. Instead of getting new trends from friends and family, people now check their favorite bloggers to find out what businesses to frequent next. With this in mind, if you have a website, you need to blog. You can engage your audience through the medium that they are most interested in.

Most web design companies understand the power of blogging when it comes to search engine optimization and Google Page Rank. Even this does not exhaust the reasoning behind blogging, it is a good enough reason in itself. Basically, if you are not blogging, then you are placing yourself behind the eight ball of your competition.

They build their links as well as their trust within Google algorithms for the long term. Your business will slowly and surely be pushed out of the organic listings if you do not change your behavior soon. There are many other technical reasons that you should be blogging as well. No matter your industry, your business can definitely benefit from the effort.

Here’s why:

First and foremost, writing blogs for a company creates a company culture that very few other methods can match. One of the more recent examples of a successful social media startup is HubSpot. HubSpot is known as the “all in one social media platform.”

The company recently had over $30 million placed into it by Google. If this were not enough of an indication of their success, perhaps you would be interested in why it could grow as one of the fastest startup companies on the Internet of the past few years. HubSpot allows every one of its more than 300 employees to blog on behalf of the company at any time.

Not only does this help to create incentives for individual employees to research topics and stay on top of current trends. It also manifests a company culture difficult to duplicate elsewhere. Everyone feels important. Yet, everyone feels as though they are a part of a team effort.

This is a balance that most businesses regrettably never achieve. If you are to take the example of this very successful company to heart, then you will blog for no other reason than to create camaraderie. No matter how successful your longtail keyword placement or internal link-building strategies within the blog may be.

Theoretically, the more blogging you do, the more quickly major search engines begin to index your content if everyone is blogging. If you take this advice, make sure that your link building is coordinated and organized. This means that each person blogging needs to research the blogs of their colleagues, which only helps to build company culture as well.

Blogging Helps Your Sales Pitch

There is a reason for the maxim “If you want to learn, teach.” Researching content every day as well as organizing thoughts about certain topics for the sake of a blog helps keep your sword sharp when it comes to offline sales presentations. There is a marked difference between someone who writes about something every day and someone who does it only on weekends and holidays.

In today’s specialized, instantaneous culture, people look for experts with detailed, current advice. The number one way to avail yourself of all the resources that are present online is to blog about relevant topics in your industry every day.

Because blogs are meant for consumers, you learn to explain things in a way that your customers understand easily. This helps you to translate your technical expertise into layperson’s terms and incorporate humor. Keep the hard selling to a minimum while showcasing your own personality and engaging the customer.

Blogging keeps you sharp for all questions that customers may throw at you. When you have to find the answers to your own questions in order to be considered an expert for your own blog, you will find that customer questions become quite easy.

Blogging helps you become the expert voice in your industry. People like to know that they are talking to the foremost authority in the industry before they trust that business with their money. One of the quickest ways to become known as an expert is to blog on your own as well as a guest blog on known entities within your industry.

Do not make the mistake of thinking that writing great blogs will lead directly to sales. They won’t. It takes a great deal of time as well as consistency to become known as an expert in your field and turn your helpful content into revenue for your business. Do not worry about the money you spend at the beginning of the process of generating content. It pays off in the end.

Simply Blog Well

Keep up with the latest trends in your industry and the money will follow. In short, helpful content leads people to trust you. Once people trust you, you can generate leads. The more leads you have, the more sales that come to you over time.

People tend to trust the individuals who take the time to teach in a patient way. You should not try to impress anyone with an overload of content in one blog. The trust comes from the time that you spend with your audience.

Fourth, blogging helps to solidify your niche in the market and get rid of leads that are not qualified. If you have ever wasted time on the phone with a lead not qualified for your business, then you understand the importance of targeting. The more time that your sales department spends with leads that are not qualified, the less time they have to service the needs of leads that actually are qualified.

Having increased visibility is a great ego boost. Especially in the startup phase of a business. In this phase, your main goal should be to increase your reach. However, only attract customers looking for a steal or window shoppers who just want to waste your time with questions, then your business will not get the revenue that it needs to survive.

Look for Value Shoppers

These people understand and pay for true quality in a product. You should not have to oversell yourself or offer endless incentives for your customer base to purchase. Doing so is an indication that you attract the wrong kind of person. To attract quality, you must be known as quality. As stated before, the easiest way to present yourself as a quality personality in your industry is to blog consistently.

The more that you blog, the more that you can showcase the quality of your content. Often, value shoppers look over many blogs before they decide on that initial call to your office to make a purchase. By the time that they get to you, they will be well versed in your opinions and research on your industry.

If you then integrate the content of your blog into your sales approach, you can turn that lead into a qualified, converted customer. When you track your analytics, you can see the fruits of your labor. The customers you do have to be sure to service their needs above all others. Remember the 80/20 rule,  20% of your customer base provides 80% of your sales.

Lastly, the blog comment promotes discussion between your company and your customer base. At Links Web Design, we actually do not recommend turning this option on. Especially as a small business with limited staff to monitor comments.

However, there could be some benefits to using the comment sections…

There is perhaps no better way to engage with your audience than in the blog comments section. Here they can express their opinions on your articles, validate your research, and offer updates of their own. If you have a good, quality audience, many times you can take topics for later blogs from the comment sections of earlier blogs.

The blog comment section is also a great way to learn about your customer base from a first-hand perspective. It allows you to see the world through the eyes of your customer. Perhaps most importantly, blog comments provide a sense of community between your customers.

As they begin talking to each other, they invariably begin to coalesce their opinions around your company. As you are seen as the catalyst for discussion, you quickly become known as an expert within this community. Then, you can branch out and take your leads to the social circles of the people who comment on your blog.

Blog comments are also a great way to find questions to answer. Answering questions from your audience helps to keep you engaged. You will be seen as an active member of the community as well as a leader. This is necessary to keep your audience interested in your opinion. No one cares what you know until they know that you care about them.

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Links Web Design is a Website Design Company in Bangor, Maine.