does your small business need a blog? {two reasons why the answer may be yes}

Your business, especially if you have a small business,
could benefit greatly from a blog for a variety of reasons.

One of my current social media clients is a local children’s boutique. One of the main components of their online strategy is developing a great blog. We began brainstorming blog topics almost immediately and created a list of over 50 potential posts within about an hour. Some posts are product related but many move beyond specific products and into the deeper branding of the business and meeting the information and resource needs of their customers

But a blog, badly done, can be the worst thing you can do for your business. Blogs are a lot of work. A badly written blog with poor images and lack of cohesiveness will negatively impact your business. Brand Driven Digital has identified six ways a blog can be hurting, not helping, a business. These include a weak call to action, lack of focus, lack of alignment with business goals, and poor writing.

Bottom line, a blog can become one of the most valuable tools in your marketing toolbox—IF you do it right!

Now you’re asking, how do I do it right? Over the next several weeks we will look at building a solid business blog through the framework of the basic questions of journalism:  Why?  What?  Who?  When? Where? and How?

Why does my small business need a blog?

If a website is the hub of your online presence, a blog located on your site is the heart. A blog allows you to tell stories about your business. It allows you to provide important information. It shows your customers (and potential customers) that you know what you are talking about. And it provides much of the search engine optimization (SEO) that is needed to get better placement in search engine results.  5 Most Important Online Tools for Small Businesses

There are two main reasons a blog can be an asset to your small business marketing plan:
SEO and storytelling.

SEO {search engine optimization} is what makes your website “findable” online. SEO involves keywords and links and can be very confusing sometimes. But it is important, vitally important, to the success of your website. Blogs help with SEO because, unlike a static web page, a blog undergoes regular updating and provides the means for including those key words and other tools to improve your placement in search engine results. {If you want to understand more about SEO, we recommend reading this excellent and simple SEO explanation from searchenginewatch.com.}

Besides SEO, your blog creates a way for you to tell the stories of your small business. I know, you are thinking, “My business doesn’t have a story.” It does, I promise. At the STRENGTH conference, one of the attendees owned a landscaping and lawn care business. When I mentioned storytelling as a factor in marketing, he laughed. Literally. But as I shared with him ideas for blog posts such as choosing flowers and plants, creating a beautiful container garden, knowing when and how much to water, his eyes lit up. He realized a simple truth, every question one of his customers asks is the opportunity to tell part of his business’s story. The same is true no matter what your business is. You have a story, tell it! {A great example of a small business owner who uses her blog to tell her story is Maggie Whitley of Gussy Sews. By inviting her customers into her life, she has built a loyal community around the Gussy brand.}

Next week, we’ll be exploring WHAT you can and should write about on your business blog.

What do you think?  Should small business websites have blogs?

Check out the rest of the posts in this series:

• Creating Quality Content
• Identifying Your Audience
• The Time Factor
• A Few Last Thoughts