7 reasons to start a blog to promote your business

In today's world, most businesses have a website promoting their products and services. They'll have a page presenting their business and then go into the details of what products they sell, or what services they offer. However, there is often a limit to how much information they can publish on the website, simply because of the structure of the site.

Here come blogs!



Photo credit: Kevin Dooley

Business blogs bring numerous advantages, and help you on your journey to promote your business better and get more customers. Plus, with all the blogging platforms available today, it couldn't be easier to start a blog. So let's get right into it, and see what a blog can do for you:

1. A blog helps establishing your brand and show that you are an expert in your field.

Publishing regular content about your industry, offering advice, tips or product reviews will convince people that you have expertise in your field.

2. A blog drives more traffic to your website.

Every blog post is a new opportunity to link to your website. Blogging regularly and creating relevant content will also help with your google search ranking and bring you more visitors.

3. A blog helps you improve your relationship with your customers.

Where else can you talk to your customers, show them your view on your industry, give them advice or even ask them questions? Embracing comments is a wonderful way to get feedback from your customers and know what they actually want or need from you.

4. A blog helps you promote your services.

If you are in the service industry, you can easily use your blog to showcase the latest work you've done for a client. A landscape designer could for example write a "before/after" post and impress their readers with the end result. Showcases or case studies are some of the best ways to convince your clients that they need your services, by simply showing them how they could benefit from working with you.

5. A blog helps you sell your products.

Why not write your own product review? Explain what makes your product better than the competition's, list all its benefits, tell people how to use it, show tips and tricks, or unusual ways people have used this product for. As an example, have a look at the Evernote Blog. Evernote is an online note taking application, and they make a brilliant use of their blog, showing amongst other things how some people use Evernote in a creative way to simplify their life.

6. A blog keeps people coming back to your site.

As long as you publish content that is relevant to your business, offer value to your readers, people will come back to your blog! If you publish regularly, your readers will know they can expect some new information on your site and will come back for it.

7. It's free!

Do you know the advertising rate in your local newspaper, or how much a radio advert would cost you? Well let me tell you we're talking big numbers. Blogging, on the other end, can be done at no cost if you choose so! Plus your content will stay on the web for as long as you want it to. It's not a single publication, or a week-long campaign, you can in fact benefit from it day after day, after day.

By now you should get a better understanding of how a blog can help you promote your business, in a cost effective way. And that's what it's all about, here at the Handy Marketer. I help you promote your business with better design and clever marketing.

I'd love to hear your thoughts about blogging for business, what worked for you or what other benefits you noticed, so feel free to comment.