A website is every company’s flagship. Back then, traffic was generated via outdated push marketing. It is obvious that much has changed: no one likes to see interruptive or aggressive advertisement, neither on TV nor in the letterbox. Buying behavior has shifted and any search for a perfect solution to a problem is conducted online. Websites, which fail to be interactive, can no longer keep up. Therefore, complementary blogs are a necessity. Here, customer requests can be dealt with immediately.
Why the blog needs to be a focal point
The numbers speak for themselves: while there were only 23 blogs worldwide in 1991, the numbers have grown to over 35 million in 2006 and around 173 million blogs in 2011. The numbers are still increasing. Many of these blogs belong to companies. Studies show that companies who maintain their own blogs generate tremendously more leads, users and revenue than the ones who don’t. Yet what are the defining advantages of blogs?
Blogs are so successful since they combine the quality of traditional media with interaction that is typical of social media. If you blog, you are able to inform your customers quickly, thoroughly and effectively. The representational image of a company as well as the unique selling propositions (USPs) can be displayed on a blog. Content which is produced and clicked regularly is of course required in order to generate traffic. Users can be attracted with quality content that offers them a certain kind of added value and subsequently turned into subscribers. That way, the blog becomes an essential instrument in the process of lead generation. To put it short: a blog creates visibility for every company. Thanks to the ensuing dialog with your customers, you are able to consolidate your core competences. Creating valuable and cleverly sequenced content will help you with establishing your status as an expert in the respective field. Your posts are moreover accessible no matter the place and time.
The right positioning
Establishing a company blog is always the right option. However, if you neglect it and turn it into a kind of social media channel on which you post success stories of employees, it is clearly the wrong approach. Blogs have become a central part of online marketing and thus require management, which might be time consuming but has one simple goal: the solution of your target groups’ problems. The blog has to offer value to users and generate traffic. If you want to gain customers, you have to tag along with digital transition and virtual buying behavior. Consequently, the blog has to become a centralized focal point for potential customers.
SEO is essential
Only high-quality blog posts which offer value to users are being clicked. The work thus starts right with the content creation: optimize your posts by including relevant keywords. These should also reappear in the URL, the meta description, the page title as well as in the alt attributes of any images used. Blogging can be called a modern form of search engine optimization. Consequently, developing a defined SEO strategy that is based on topic clusters is highly advisable. By structuring your core topics, you will be able to link these to longtail-keywords in order for them to be considered relevant by search engines. Your ranking will be much higher if you concentrate and combine your keywords.
