13 Reasons Your Company Should Have a Blog
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A company blog is one of the most compelling and cost-effective ways to reach your audience. Here are 13 reasons to start a company blog or make the blog you currently have a priority.
1. Visitors to your site expect you to have a blog.
Blogging used to be dominated by individuals, but it long ago hit the corporate mainstream—according to 2018 data from the Content Marketing Institute, 79% of B2B companies and 70% of B2C companies have blogs.
2. A blog will increase visitor traffic to your site.
Businesses that blog get 55% more website traffic than those that don’t. Some of your blog traffic will come from existing customers, but a blog is a great way to get new customers as well. If someone finds one of your blog posts by doing a Google search for that topic, you earn yourself a reader who might never have heard of you otherwise.
3. Blogs demonstrate thought leadership and authority in your industry.
A well-written, thoughtful, and frequently updated blog that addresses important issues that affect your industry and customers not only shows your readers that you’re an expert in your field, but that you want to use your industry expertise to help solve their problems.
4. A blog can help you establish trust with your customers.
Make your blog an extension of your customer service efforts by using it as a platform to address common concerns or questions you hear from your customers. When you blog about things that are important to your customers, you show you truly care about their problems and want to use your expertise to provide solutions. That makes your readers trust you, and people are more likely to make purchases from a company they trust.
5. Blogs help generate leads.
B2B companies that use blogs receive 67% more leads than those that don’t, and B2B marketers rated blog posts the most effective method of demand generation in the awareness or interest stage of the sales funnel. Once you’ve attracted a potential customer with an interesting blog post, a special deal or downloadable can get them to provide their contact information and move further down the sales funnel.
6. Blogs can increase conversions.
Whether the desired action is signing up for an email newsletter or filling out a contact form, having a blog is a great way to increase conversions on your site. On average, brands that publish 15 blog posts per month convert 1,200 new leads per month.
7. A blog will help you keep current customers engaged with your brand.
Once someone makes a purchase or performs a desired action with your company, how do you make sure you stay top-of-mind with that customer in the future? Use your blog to build your relationship with your customers and keep them interested in your brand by offering content including case studies, how-tos, helpful tips, and even company news that gives them insight into your brand and culture.
8. Blogs improve your SEO.
Google penalizes sites for keyword stuffing, so there are only so many keywords you can use on your website pages. Your blog, however, offers unlimited opportunities to create keyword-rich pages that are also informative, engaging, and helpful to your customers (which Google loves). Google also rewards your site for long clicks (when someone clicks through a search result and stays on the site for a significant amount of time), as well as content that is original and recently updated.
9. Blogs help boost your social media presence.
A quick social post announcing new blog content and providing a link is a great way to connect with your social media audience. In fact, interesting content is one of the top 5 reasons people follow brands on social media.
10. A blog will generate more inbound links to your site.
According to Google, backlinks—incoming hyperlinks from other websites to yours—are one of the top three most important ranking factors. One of the best ways to get backlinks is to create interesting content on your blog that others will want to link to. Companies that blog have 97% more inbound links than those that don’t—that means more people coming to your site and potentially becoming customers.
11. A blog can increase sales.
Your blog is no place for a sales pitch, but that doesn't mean it can't drive sales. One study found that consumers are 131% more likely to buy from a brand immediately after they read educational content by that brand.
12. A blog gives your company a voice.
Your website messaging is an important way to reinforce your brand, but a blog gives you more flexibility to tell your story and convey your company’s personality, values, and goals. A blog is a great way to give your individual employees a voice as well—having multiple authors can bring different perspectives and help keep the blog well-stocked with fresh content.
13. A blog has good return on investment.
Blogs are simple to use and relatively low-cost. The most significant investment a blog requires is time, and they can generate a great return on that effort. According to research by HubSpot, companies that prioritize blogs are 13 times more likely to have a higher marketing ROI.