Every great website needs a blog. It enhances the experience of your visitors and your SEO. But how do you know what to post? And how often?
As freelance blog copywriter, I’ve considerable experience writing blogs for companies across many different industries that achieve results. So here are my five top tips to make your blog a business-booster:
Keep your blog regularly updated
For a blog to do what it should and bring visitors to your site, it can’t be something you only pay attention to every now and then. Google and all the other search engines love regularly refreshed content, and a blog is one of the easiest ways to achieve this. It’s what puts you high in the rankings above your competitors for your keywords, and keeps you there. But how often is ‘regular’? You should aim for an absolute minimum of one post a week if your blog is established, and at least two to three posts a week, if not more, for those just starting out. Analytics data always shows a huge spike in website visitors when I do a week-long blog series for a client for example, which involves a new blog post every day. It takes considerable resource, but it’s well worth it. Make no mistake – if you’re neglecting your blog, it is costing you business.
A blog mistake: No hard selling OR STUFFING
A blog is not a place for a hard-sell. Do that, and your customers will bounce straight off your website. A good blog is actually a way of selling your products or services, without actually doing any selling at all. You achieve this by ensuring your blogs are useful reading to your customers, answering their questions and giving them solutions. What this does in the minds of your customers is position you as a trusted source. It creates a relationship. So that when they decide to ‘buy’, you’re the business they turn to. And don't try to trick Google by filling your blog copy with repetitions of your keywords and key phrases with no real content. Google hates keyword stuffing, and web visitors will hate it too. The aim of your blog is to enhance your visitors' experience, so always write naturally with appropriate keyword use combined with meaningful content.
Blog topics: The golden rule
So you want to do a regular blog – what do you talk about? It’s a huge mistake to focus on your business. When thinking about blog topics, here’s the golden rule – think always with your customer in mind. Put yourself in their shoes. Why would they come to your site in the first place? What are they looking for? What products or services would they be interested in? And most importantly, how can you help them? Think about what they would want to read. And don’t just look internally for potential topics. External news, generated by industry bodies or organisations relating to your business, is always a great resource. As long as you make the news relevant to your customers. How it’s going to impact them, and how you can help. These types of blogs help to position you as a business with its finger on the pulse, at the forefront of your industry and its developments, always thinking about your customers. Further enhancing your reputation in the eyes of your visitors.
Outsourcing your blog - the right writer
If you don’t have the in-house resource or skill to regularly update your blog, consider outsourcing your blog by hiring a freelance blog writer. Blog writers aren’t just copywriters. We are specialist writers who know how to write ‘as’ your business, in the voice and tone your customers need, with the information they want, in the way Google wants to see it. Anyone can be a copywriter, but not everyone has the skill to be a blog writer. They are very different things; so choose carefully if you do want to outsource blog provision.
Blog content for sharing
You want your blog to not only be useful to your users – but to others as well. Share-worthy blog content is what you’re striving for, and there’s no better way to get it than with blogs that give tips, advice and information, relating to your products and services. Again – no hard-sell. Just useful stuff you’d want to read about too, if you were a typical customer of your business. Do not underestimate how information hungry people are. Thanks to technology, everything and anything is researched online before any decisions are made, whether it’s someone looking for fertility treatment or which tile to buy for a bathroom. Blogs that offer impartial advice, useful tips and information will ensure you’re included and on their radar.
If you’re considering hiring a freelance blog writer and you’d like to see some examples of blog posts I’ve produced for clients, get in touch – elizabeth@elizabethwilsoncopywriting.com - or contact me here.