Top 10 Reasons to Start a Blog for Your Small Business!

A Blog Can Serve You Well as a “Central Hub” for Your Online Business.

Having a blog for your business not only will build your credibility with potential clientele, but it can build your brand, generate countless leads for your business, build relationships with potential prospects, and it can generate multiple streams of income.

Whether you have your own home-based, online business or have a Landscaping business like my friend Sirio, it works the same.

Here Are a Few Additional Statistics about Blogs.

• 77% of Internet users read blogs.
• Small businesses with Blogs generate 126% more leads.
• 82% of consumers enjoy reading relevant content from brands.
• 81% of US consumers trust the advice and information from blogs.
• 434% of websites with blogs have more indexed pages in the search results.

Let’s Break this Down!

1. A Professional Blog can Build Your Personal Brand

Your blog is your own PR machine! This is your own public relations soapbox; it will be the portal to showcase your views on specific topics in your industry which will help establish your authority in your niche… it will also show your expertise to attract your target market.

Now day’s people have a tendency to put their trust in a person rather than a corporation. When it comes time to connect with your potential prospect, your lead will know that they are dealing with a person instead of the pressure tactics usually followed with a company rep.

2. Build Strong Relationships – Network with Influential Bloggers

Your blog is a great platform to create and build strong relationships. These relationships will help build trust for your company or brand and create loyal readers who can turn into friends and leads for your business.

With a few additions, you can create a marketing funnel to offer your products or services… this marketing tool will also help sign them into your primary business.

3. Blogging Can Build Credibility

Develop Yourself as an Expert – Interacting with your readers will not only help you create those relationships, but it will help brand you as an expert in your field.

You can look at it this way… would you trust the opinion of a complete stranger or one that you have built a relationship with whom you would consider a friend?

Potential prospects or customers would like to know who is behind your product or service. If you have a healthy relationship with your readers, it will give your business a boost in the credibility department. It also puts a face to the name, so to speak!

4. Attract Recurring Visitors

With your blog changing frequently, people are more inclined to want to visit more often to see what has been added. In a nutshell, a blog will give the reader a reason to come back to your site!

A study conducted by Barilliance found that returning visitors:

• Spent 16% more per transaction
• Converted 73% more than first-time visitors
• Added items to carts 65% more than first-time visitors

Having return visitors is a good practice to implement into your business plan. With all the options you have at your disposal, a WordPress blog is designed to help you do just that.

Did you know that returning visitors have a greater chance of buying your products over first-time visitors?

Returning customers also have the potential to drive more sales for your online business due to recommending your business to their friends.

You as the blog owner, have options to grab your readers ‘reoccurring’ attention.

Setting up your blog to give your readers different options is key. Using an email marketing platform (Affiliate Link) can automatically send email messages based on your readers’ actions, like subscribing to a newsletter or clicking a link, etc.

5. Feedback for Your Business

Blogging will allow your readers to provide you will valuable feedback and insight for the product or service you provide. This will allow you to make changes you see are necessary for your target market, which will help create quality and success in your business.

Try to remember that your readers came to your site for a need that had to be met, so count them as your best prospects. Consider your reader’s feedback with the utmost importance.

Another great feature of owning a blog is that you can receive this insight from your readers within minutes of publishing your content.

Are you starting to see why you need a blog for your small business? Here are 5 more reasons!

6. Traffic from the Search Engines

Providing regularly updated content will enhance your online presence. Have you ever wondered why you see blogs at the top of the search engine results pages? Search engines love frequently updated sites.

The more quality information you provide, the greater your chances of increasing your blog’s presence in the Search-Engine Results Pages (SERP’s). This will send targeted traffic to your site for those searching for your product or service (placing the proper keyword phrases can many times be a large deciding factor).

7. Social Proof and Visibility for Your Business

Your blog can be your Number One marketing tool. Besides the organic (SEO) method of creating visitors, a blog comes well-equipped with the unlimited ability for getting people back to your site. One of which is by adding social networking plug-ins to syndicate your content to a variety of social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Digg, and StumbleUpon – just to name a few.

If you provide quality content, other bloggers will frequently link to your site, which will help create your site as an authority, further improving your visibility and placement in the search engine results pages.

8. Ease of Use

The WordPress blog platform, which is used by over 25 million people, is the number 1 rated Content Management System (CMS) which is a very user-friendly and customizable platform that allows you the freedom to add or delete pages, and upload documents, and images yourself.

So, what exactly is a Content Management System (CMS)? – it is a way that you can update your Small Business Website (blog), whenever you have changes… no waiting on your webmaster’s schedule.

• No Scripting knowledge is needed.
• Ease of use for those that will need to maintain their website.
• No need to be Tech Savvy when it comes to computers.
• So simple a Cave Man can do it

With your online business growing, keeping track of your website pages can be less than fun, but with a WordPress CMS platform, the hassle of maintaining your website with multiple pages has been stripped away.

Also, with the rise of mobile technology, you can add or update any one of your blog pages or update your blog as a whole in one step.

The cool thing about this is that it can be done from anywhere you have Internet access… it can be done while traveling, whether you use your laptop or your phone.

9. Press Releases

Press Releases are an important step for your online business, but can cost large amounts of money. Have you ever wondered how the most popular bloggers market their products or services? They blog about it!

Using your WordPress blogging platform for your business is not only FREE, but it can direct targeted advertising to your most qualified prospects. Can FREE advertising to your targeted customers get any better than that?

REASON NUMBER 10.

Because You MUST… Why? – Because a WordPress blog is also known to be one of the greatest Networking Business Tools for any Internet Marketer to succeed!

Besides it being very user-friendly for the less than tech-savvy person, it’s very versatile in nature.

Conclusion – Why YOU Need a Blog for Your Business!

To REVIEW – Having a Central Hub for your small business is a great way to get information out there about your products or services… getting valuable feedback from actual buyers is a big plus to improve your business!

You don’t have to be a Website Designer to have your own site. Getting your statement out there to the world about your product or service is worth creating a blog. If you are new to blogging, then consider this a journey to reach your final successful business destination.

Just remember, your blog will be the location to share your knowledge and expertise, labeling you as an authority in your niche.

It will also be the place to build those strong relationships and trust with your future customers and prospects, not to mention it will be the portal for signing people into your business.