Why Blogging is Critical to Business Success

Please welcome Courtney Ramirez, content marketing consultant and owner of Six Degrees Content to the Endurance Marketing blog. I met Courtney through LinkedIn and am thrilled she’s taken time out of her busy schedule to share her insights with us! Welcome Courtney!

It’s been a long time since blogs were used primarily as online journals – but despite their proven use as a marketing tool, many businesses owners haven’t embraced blogs. Without a blog your business could be missing out on some important opportunities for finding, connecting with and converting your ideal customers.

Why is blogging so critically essential?

Blogging builds authority.

Your potential customers are just like anyone else – they want to work with a company that knows their stuff. Having authority in your niche means being able to command respect and attention and this can spell big profits for your business. By blogging regularly, you’re growing a body of work that is helpful, engaging and most importantly, visible to the world.

Blogging provides social media fuel.

Without great content to share, you’ll be floundering in social media. While it’s important to re-tweet and share resources from others, you need to create and share your own content. Weekly or daily blog posts from your company can be used to create a winning social media marketing plan.

Blogging helps people make buying decisions.

Think blog posts can’t possibly equal sales? A recent HubSpot marketing survey showed that 71% of respondents used blogs in making purchasing decisions either somewhat or very much. Reading product reviews, getting to know a company’s expertise and philosophy and vetting their experience are all part of reading a blog – and all part of how you can use your blog to increase profits.

Blogging lets you stand out – without being overly promotional.

Direct marketing is all about shouting about your product, service and expertise. But blogging offers a more subtle – and more effective – type of selling called content marketing. By creating a distributing relevant content, you’re showing your target audience that you understand their needs and have solutions that can help. A blog can help your company stand out in your market and present a unique voice.

Blogging helps you get search engine traffic.

Search engines love blog content. Without going into a lot of detail about search engine algorithms, just understand that the words on your website are used by search engines to classify your website. The more you blog about “discount blue widgets” the higher your rankings will increase for “discount blue widgets.” On top of that, your blog updates will “ping” the search engines meaning that your sites will be more frequently indexed – and therefore – more likely to get traffic and interest.

Blogs are a simple and effective way to market your business through content. Considering the fact that they feed directly into social media marketing and search engine traffic there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be blogging! Whether you’re a one person business or a large corporation, blogging should be on your agenda.

Courtney Ramirez is owner and Head Copywriter at Six Degrees Content – an online copywriting and content marketing company. She helps small businesses and entrepreneurs on the grow bring their message to the world through online content, press releases, blog posts and more. You can follow her on Twitter @6degreescontent