Is blogging still relevant for small business? Yes!
According to Worldometers there are approximately 3.7 million blog posts written every day, so it’s no wonder many content creators struggle with cutting through the noise, reaching their target audience, and finding a positive return on investment (ROI) from their blog.
So if you’re scratching your head wondering how you can make your blog work for your business, you’ll want to read on.
MYTH #1: If you build it, they will come
“Let’s build some epic sporting venues for the Olympic Games. Heaps of people will use the venues after the 2-week Games are over,” they said.
Four years after the closing ceremony of the Athens Games, as many as 21 out of the 22 venues lie abandoned.
Unfortunately, many small business websites and blogs end up like those venues – abandoned ghost towns.
So why does this happen?
Most small business owners focus too much time, money and resources on creating content, but not nearly enough on promoting it.
Here’s Pareto’s 80-20 rule when applied to content marketing:
- 20% content creation (production)
- 80% content promotion
The same applies to your marketing budget.
Read more: 3 Marketing Tips You Need to Know – With Entrepreneur Jamie Stenhouse
MYTH #2: You can wing it
When it comes to being successful in building a blog that brings you clients, you can’t make it up as you go.
When Trackzen co-founder Paul Higgins (a genius at helping business owners scale) approached us to help with his content, he had already produced and published some blog posts but was struggling to get engagement.
Our team helped Paul get clear on his strategy, edit his posts to make them more engaging (i.e. “less corporate”) for his target audience, and then he shared one on “The daily habits successful business people use to fast track their business” on Linkedin.
We were delighted with the results:
You need a content marketing strategy.
Check out the 5 reasons why using a content strategy will make you more effective (including the 5 types of content that every small business needs to create).
MYTH #3: You can’t prove ROI
Every business owner wants to make sure they see a return on investment.
Ask any marketing manager or chief marketing officer and they will tell you that marketing is not an exact science. After all, it’s about conducting well-planned experiments over specific time frames and then seeing whether or not the results match up.
Having said that, there are tools out there that make it easier to measure our marketing efforts.
Every small business website should have Google Analytics installed and tracking traffic to the site as well as specific goals for their blog.
MYTH #4: You have to always blog about your product or service
There are many reasons to produce content, and the end goal is to build a following for your business and transform some readers into customers.
There’s content that talks about your product or service benefits and features, but if that’s all you’re sharing you’re missing out on a huge opportunity.
Share your company values, culture, and stories that show your personality and what makes you, your clients and your team unique.
People buy from people they like and trust.
Read more: 5 Tips For Building A Great Visual Brand
MYTH #5: You can’t outsource content
Creating content can take a founder away from more important tasks like improving team performance, developing culture, onboarding new clients, and ensuring existing clients are happy.
Content can be outsourced – just make sure to find someone who invests time to understand your business, tone and voice, target audience, and objectives.
So there you have it, we’ve just covered the top 5 myths around blogging for business and some practical steps for making your blog profitable.
Pick ONE thing to tackle next – either creating a content strategy, installing Google Analytics and setting up some trackable goals for your blog, or outsourcing your content creation. Make that work and then you can move onto the rest.
