Do you know what the big problem is with online marketing techniques? The ideas generally accepted as true are almost invariably outdated. That’s because online marketing is still evolving rapidly and that means practices are changing faster than the conventional wisdom is.
That’s true of most online marketing practices, but it applies doubly to blogging. Not so long ago, blogging was niche. It belonged to a fringe of the internet where most people never tread, much like the dark web does today. But blogging has come into the light and younger generations are . That means that suddenly it has become a very useful medium indeed. Here are some other outdated beliefs and the new truth.
Blogging is a lot of work
The first misconception is that blogging is a big amount of work. And sure, considered in isolation there is a lot that you’ve got to do. But these things should never be considered in isolation. Instead, they should be compared to the alternatives. Is blogging a lot of work in comparison to, say, cold calling or personally designing all of the ads you put out through social media?
In fact, if you treat blogging like other marketing efforts – as in you outsource parts of it to specialists – then it isn’t labor intensive at all. It can come in at a fixed monthly cost, the occasional discussion of topics and proof-reading material to make sure it continues to fit your company’s tone.
There is nothing to be learned
Another problem with companies that dabble and then stop is that they don’t give themselves time to actually learn the ropes. And that’s a big problem, as writing isn’t something that you just master overnight. It takes a lot of time and practice to actually get to grips with how to best draw in your audience and keep them reading.
For a blog to be effective, the people who are running it need to spend time figuring out new tips and tricks, becoming better writers and finding better people who to employ or with who they can collaborate.
This might push some businesses away from blogging. That’s unfortunate, as the skills learned through blogging are hugely applicable to a wide range of topics. That’s because writing is such an important skill with a wide range of benefits, such as becoming a better communicator both internally and externally.
Simply working with a highly-skilled writer and reviewing his descriptive writing examples can teach us a great deal about best practices and what kind of mistakes we make.
Blogging isn’t cost-effective
There are a lot of people who try blogging, don’t see good results and then abandon the effort as a waste of money. And that’s understandable. Anything done badly isn’t going to be cost-effective.
If it is done well, however, then it is going to be hugely effective to draw people in. There are two ways blogging can pull people into your site. These are:
- Social media.
- Search engines.
In both of these blogging has a serious advantage, in that in both cases they can spread organically. People often share what they believe will be useful. Well written blogs fit right into that category.
Similarly, blogs are incredibly effective in ranking you well in terms of SEO. That’s because an effective blogging strategy creates a great deal more content that search engines can crawl over and rank for keywords related to what you’re trying to sell.
Even better, Google likes blogs! That’s because blogs offer their users information about topics. And as they’re in the business of giving users easy access to the answer they’re looking for so that people keep coming back to their service, sending people to high-quality blogs is attractive to them.
A third way in which blogging works incredibly well is that while most marketing efforts might give you access to a lot of people when you put them up, the moment you stop pumping money into these strategies, the people drop away as well. They have no legs. Blogs are different. Well-written content can stay relevant and therefore draw in audiences for months, even years.
Blogging is enough
On the flip side, many people start blogging and expect that to be enough to carry them to fame. Unfortunately, that’s not how blogging works. Initially, for it to be effective you do need to use other marketing strategies to get the content out there. This can mean paying to share it across social media or to position it on search engines.
To many, this seems like it, therefore, makes blogging doubly expensive. Why they wonder, should I pay double? Why not simply advertise my products instead of advertising my blog posts? And they are right in that regard if they’re only looking at one specific window of time.
The thing is, once their blogging does become successful and they do manage to get their content widely read, then that becomes self-perpetuating. The site will rank well and new content will automatically appear in people’s searches. At that point, blogging will start to earn back the money you initially needed to invest.In fact, it can even become self-sustaining with writers actually clamoring to contribute to your blog in order to build up their own portfolio.So, there you have it
If you haven’t yet started blogging then you’re really selling your business short. It’s a great way to get exposure and steer more traffic to your website. It can also serve a lot of other purposes, such as defining your brand, making your company appear more personable and even formulating what makes your brand and your product better than that of the competition.
That’s a lot of benefits from what basically amounts to posting the occasional bit of text on your site. For that reason, you really shouldn’t wait. Find a decent writer, schedule some content and make sure that you keep it chugging along. The benefits will be huge.
About the author:
Norman Arvidsson is an enthusiastic guest contributor and marketing planner. He knows everything about technology, business writing, and web design. You can contact him via Twitter.
