CONTENTS:
WHAT IS BLOGGING & WHY BLOG?
HOW & WHERE DOES BLOGGING FIT IN THE DIGITAL MARKETING PICTURE?
BENEFITS OF BLOGGING IN TERMS OF DIGITAL MARKETING.
Blogging for Superior Results from your Digital Marketing Efforts
Digital marketing has radically altered the marketing landscape in recent years. A larger number of businesses including big and small ones use digital marketing channels for advertising and promotions. Search advertising, social media promotions, and email marketing are some of the most commonly used digital channels marketers use for the promotion of their brands. However, apart from these channels and for a higher impact and improved ROI, you need to include blogging as a part of your digital marketing strategy. It is great for both online and physical businesses that want to improve their market presence and grow their customer base. Businesses use email marketing for lead generation mainly. They use social media and paid advertising for the promotion of their products and services. However, blogging can help businesses gain some extra edge and create extra impact through their digital marketing efforts. Apart from that, the advantages of blogging in terms of marketing can be more lasting compared to seasonal campaigns and other customer engagement efforts.
 Whether it is a large brand with an international audience or a small one in a local market, both can benefit from having a blog. Blogging not just helps you derive better results from your digital marketing efforts but also helps you establish your credibility and grow customer trust. In terms of digital marketing, the advantages of blogging are more long-lasting than the seasonal marketing campaigns most companies run. Blogging can bolster the results of your advertising and promotional campaigns. When you combine paid promotions with blogging, you will find that the engagement rate and ROI from your marketing campaigns grow better and the customer retention rate is higher.Â
What is blogging and Why blog?
Blogging first appeared during the 1990s and people mainly used blogs to keep personal online journals. They were known as weblogs. However, blogging did not advance till the late 1990s until blogging platforms like Live Journal and Blogger appeared. WordPress, which is now the most popular blogging platform arrived during the early 2000s and that’s when blogging took off. In the course of time, entrepreneurs identified the marketing potential of blogging. Now, people blog for marketing and information sharing, and for several their personal blogs are also a source of earnings.
You can create a blog and start blogging for any reason and not just marketing. Some people are blog writers because it is their hobby. Others are professional blog writers and blogging is their main source of revenue. Yes, a blog with a large reader base can also be an excellent source of revenue. Blogging is used by educational institutions for teaching, sharing information, and distance education. Moreover, blogs can be used to express views and opinions. For example, there are media blogs or ‘The Conversation‘ that share the opinions and views of experts on important and current topics. So, blogs serve a wide range of objectives and you can achieve more than just marketing and promotions through a blog. Blogs are for education, connection, promotions and even to generate leads and grow sales.
How and where does a blog fit in the digital marketing picture?
The picture of digital marketing has grown much larger in recent years. It encompasses everything from social media to email marketing, paid online advertising, video marketing, and viral marketing through social media. Social media has grown the number of opportunities for digital marketers. Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter are also superb channels for marketing and promotions.
However, despite the growth and popularity of social media, email marketing, and online advertising, blogs retain a special place for themselves in the world of digital marketing. The digital marketing industry is growing fast. Google, Facebook, and Twitter are the leading players in this industry right now. However, there are other major players too including Microsoft and Yahoo.
Content marketing has continued to grow in popularity because of its effectiveness. For most businesses using content marketing to grow their customer base, blogs are among the leading channels of online marketing. Online advertising giants like Facebook and Google have their content blogs targeted at unique customer segments to drive higher engagement. However, the brands that engage in blogging are mostly interested in long-term results. It takes some time to build readership and grow your audience. So, if you want to generate faster results, you can rely on search advertising and social media advertising. However, if you combine them with blogging to promote your blog online using these methods, the results can be better. So, while blogging can generate extraordinary results, it is not a substitute for paid search advertising or social media promotions. Blogging is not costly like the other promotional methods but it may require more focus and efforts and will take some time before it starts yielding results. Once the results start pouring in, there is nothing stopping you and your brand from growing.
What are the benefits of blogging in terms of digital marketing?
As already mentioned, Blogs are multipurpose channels that can be used to achieve more than just your marketing objectives. The advantages of blogging are many and so are the purposes of blogging. However, in the case of businesses both small and large, it is mostly to promote products and services or to drive higher engagement. One simple content-rich blog can amplify and grow the effect of your marketing efforts. The larger brands use it for customer engagement and education too. Read more about the advantages of blogging for businesses and entrepreneurs below:-
Higher Visibility :-
Every brand wants to stand out and gain higher visibility than its competitors. It has a direct impact on sales. For this purpose, businesses invest in paid promotions and try several methods of marketing including digital advertising and email marketing. However, blogging can also help you increase your visibility and interest and engage your customers in new ways. Blogging helps you get found online easily. It improves your search engine rankings. When your blog ranks on the first page for specific search queries, more and more visitors come to your website through your blog and know your products and services. This increases traffic which you can convert into sales through a call to action. Moreover, you can use blogging to attract new customers or bring the attention of existing customers to new products and services. As already mentioned, the results of blogging are typically more lasting than seasonal campaigns or paid media. You just need to add more and more evergreen content to your blog and update it regularly. You should complement your marketing efforts with blogging to retain the value you derive from them.
New customer acquisition channel:-
Blogging is great for marketing as well as customer acquisition. You can attract new customers using your blog. New customers who search for products and services online will find you easily in the search results. You can even convert users into customers by using a blog to attract and engage them. Your blog must have sufficient content for this purpose. You can include ‘Call to Action’ (CTA) buttons on these posts to direct your customers to the sales page. The landing pages of your blog do not just promote your brand but also help you acquire new customers and build new relationships. If your blog is rich in content, it will also help you get more organic traffic from the search engines.
Connect with your customers and Engage them :-
Blogging is excellent for both customer connection and customer relationship management. Your customer is at the center of everything. The stronger your customer connection, the higher customer loyalty you will enjoy. To establish deeper customer connections you can use your blog as a customer engagement channel. Your customers/followers can subscribe to your blog which will keep bringing them back when you publish new ones. For achieving a higher engagement level, do not just promote your products or write only about your products and services but write on related topics that are useful for your customers, and will engage them.
You can publish DIY posts or create a beautiful collage of images and include them in your posts to engage your users. Suppose you own a coffee business, you can publish posts related to roasting coffee at home or selecting the right coffee flavor. Any business can find a large range of related DIY topics to write about. Fashion brands write about the latest fashion brands. This will help them establish better customer connection and strengthen their relationships with the customers.Â
Grow trust and build your brand image :-
For a business to grow and stand out, it must have a strong image. Whether small or large businesses, a strong image makes them stand out and improves their competitive strength. To secure a leading position in the market and be your customers’ favorite, you need to build a superior level of trust and a strong image. Businesses mainly focus on the quality of products/services, customer service, and marketing to grow trust and build a strong image. However, a blog can also be a great tool for generating trust and building a strong image.
While you will reach more customers through your blog, you can also build a stronger connection and use the blog as a customer service channel. Offer helpful DIY articles that help people and publish posts that help customers understand your business better. On the one hand, it drives engagement. On the other, it helps you win customers’ hearts.
It would help if you also blogged about your organizational culture, human resource policies, and other aspects of your business, including marketing. Letting people know about the values that drive you also helps strengthen the trust level. The more your customers rely on you, the faster your business flourishes.