When I started my company, it took me a long time to start a company blog.
A really long time.
My background is in inbound marketing, so I know the value of having a company blog! I’ve seen it work on dozens of companies, firsthand. Our company would step in, implement an inbound marketing strategy (that always included adding a blog to someone’s website), and within 90 days, leads would come in, like clockwork.
But still, I hesitated.
It wasn’t until I’d written 10,000 words on internal process documents that I felt ready.
And now, a handful of posts in, I can safely say it was the right decision. In fact, within six hours of writing my first blog post, Google told me I was getting search traffic. Not much, but enough to tell me that establishing a blog was the right call. And that was all I needed to stay motivated and create a content strategy I can follow.
You’re reading this article because you’re thinking of starting a company blog, right? But there’s something inside you that’s making you hesitate. You want to know if now is the right time for you to take the plunge into blogging. Find out whether you should start a blog now or you should wait. But you’ll see — there’s no compelling reason to not add content marketing to your lineup.
Reasons to start a company blog
Build organic traffic
Organic traffic is the traffic that comes to your site through search engines (instead of social, paid advertising, or direct traffic). Organic traffic is earned not bought. It’s not free, per se, because you’re spending time and/or money creating content instead of ads. There’s really only one way to get organic traffic and that’s through really good, search engine optimized content. Done correctly, organic traffic can be just as good (if not better!) at driving your audience to your blog as any other method.
Establish yourself as an authority
When you write thousands of words about something that you’re well-informed on, people will read those words and believe that you know your stuff — because you do. Once start writing, readers will come to your blog for answers. This puts you in a position of authority and leadership. Look at someone like Neil Patel. Or Seth Godin. Or Amy Porterfield. You’re as much an expert as anyone on your topic. Start writing, and that’ll soon become clear.
Target your potential clients
Your potential clients are online searching for answers — answers you could be giving them. Put yourself in their shoes and write down the things your potential clients are searching for. Use this list to help create your blog content so that they are landing on one of your blog posts. If you don’t have a blog, your ideal client or customer will land on someone else’s site and may never find you.
Grow your email list
In order to get people to opt into your mailing list, you need to establish a trusting relationship. Having a blog helps to build this bond between you and your clients. How? When your potential clients see exactly the answer they were searching for on your blog, they’re going to see that you’re a pro, an expert, and they can trust you to give them more answers that they need. Give your clients knowledge and information for free, and they’re likely to opt into your email list as well to see what other good stuff you’re giving away.
Focus on long-term results
A blog post you write today can pay off for you for months and years. Blog posts aren’t like posts on social media with a limited lifespan. Blog posts will be seen in search results for months and years to come. When you Google a question and click on a link, you’re not necessarily clicking on the article that was most recently published. Instead, you’re clicking on the article that Google has found to be the most comprehensive for a particular keyword. Create excellent content, and revisit articles that are excellent but need to be updated.
Increase in traffic overall, via inbound links
Inbound links do exactly what they say on the tin — circulate traffic within your site. Inbound links help with search engine optimization and spreading traffic to other parts of your site. In each of your blog posts, you can link to other places on your site — other posts, sure, but also your main pages. This helps to keep traffic clicking through your site instead of clicking out of it.
Differentiate you and your company from the competition
If you’re in a crowded industry (aren’t we all?), you need something to help you stand out. Blogs are an awesome way to do this because it shows that there’s someone behind the brand. You’re an individual with your own perspective and opinions. Sure, your competition might be blogging about the same topics as you, but that doesn’t make a blind bit of difference. You can look at these topics from a different angle and show your audience a different side of the story.
Increase awareness of your products and/or services
Writing a blog will give you opportunities to talk about the bread and butter of your company in more creative ways than simple product descriptions. Blog posts allow you to create a story around your products — and people remember stories more than simple informational text. For example, you could blog about a problem you had — one that’s relatable to your audience, a problem they’re experiencing too. Then you can tell them how this problem leads to the creation of a product and how the product has solved the issue for you — and it can for them too!
Answer questions and objections before they come up
Want to get ahead of the game? Here’s what to do. Have everyone in your company that talks to potential clients (and existing clients) write down every single question people ask during the sales process. Incorporate these questions into blog posts and make them a part of your content strategy. That way, people can look through your blog and 99% of their questions will have already been answered. This puts their objections aside and also saves you time. Instead of answering recurring questions, you’re focusing on the important stuff — running your business.
Reasons not to start a company blog (yet)
The above reasons are really compelling. Building the right kind of traffic. Establishing yourself as an authority. Driving traffic without directly spending on advertising. Making your company stand out. These are all fantastic and valid reasons to encourage you to take the plunge and start a blog.
But there are some big and real reasons to stay away from content marketing. Not forever. But maybe for now.
You don’t have the bandwidth
If your plate is already full, and the idea of putting one more thing on it frightens you, wait. There’s nothing wrong with waiting until you’re ready because content marketing is at least a part-time job. The time will come when your company is big enough and has the capacity to handle the work needed for a blog to be successful. Unfortunately, it’s not as simple as just writing and posting. Blogging involves keyword research, content planning, market research, promotion, and marketing, and more. If you can’t dedicate the time to this, then you could end up disappointed with the results.
You don’t have a content plan
Content plans can seem quite daunting at first. But let’s face it — without a plan, starting anything new is daunting. So put the time and effort into doing some thorough brainstorming. Start with answering every question that came up from potential and current clients. Describe your process. Talk about your “why.” Write content that your audience can relate to and content that makes you relatable.
Then, map out your plan. It can be as simple as ours here: we write one article per week and post it on Thursday mornings. The article is at least 2000 words, every time.
Sure, plans can change, but because we’re running a lean operation, creating posts once a week is a doable goal. If we get far enough ahead on content to start thinking about publishing more frequently, great! That’s an excellent “problem” to have. But for now, I feel good when we’re a few weeks ahead of schedule on our content calendar.
You can’t commit to quality
Brace yourselves for a staggering statistic. There are 300 million articles posted to blogs every single day.
300 million.
Every day.
Let that sink in a minute.
So, really, the internet doesn’t need more noise. If you’re not ready to add something special (aka signal), and you’d only add more noise to the mix, hold off. For yourself and your brand, you want to commit to writing the best content out there. You don’t want to look back and feel ashamed or embarrassed by your early work — you want to be able to use it and reference it for years to come.
You’re not ready
If you’re in this position, then I totally get it because I wasn’t ready either. Not until very recently. I just had so much on my plate. I had to finish a large percentage of my to-do list before I could start publishing. But once I started to publish content on my blog, I realized very quickly that there was no turning back. And, thankfully, I realized that writing, just like any kind of exercise, is something that gets easier with time. So your first few posts might take forever, but once you get in the habit of writing, you’ll write excellent content week after week. So, get ready.
In summary
Start a blog for your business. Now, if possible. But if you can’t commit to starting a company blog now, set a date 30 days into the future, and start it then. I strongly believe that having a blog for your business will only bring you benefits in the long run. It will help you to come across and a leader and authority figure beat your competition, show off your products and create a relationship with your audience. Now, who doesn’t want all of that for their business?
You need to invest the time or money or both into thorough keyword research in order to get the most from your blog. By doing this research regularly you’ll make sure that you’re keeping your content current. It will also allow you to write the best pieces of content for your keywords and your market.