What is a blog and blog marketing? Why should you care?

The word blog stands for weblog but the meaning does not confine in web log. Now blog is defined as a website wherein the content is written and added chronologically. Blog may be online journal, web diary and web log but now it is distinguished as simply blog. 

Blog term is also used as to create blogs or updates blogs. The blog is defined by what is contained within it. So these types of blogs are defined with the type of content, these include: 

Artlog – A blog just for different mediums of art, allowing others to comment on the art. 

Photoblog – A type of blog meant to display pictures, and discuss them. 

Sketchblog – Sketchblogs are chronicles of sketches of an artist that can be talked about. 

Vlog – Vlogs are for videos of all types. 

MP3 Blog – MP3 blogs are meant for music, so it can be shared with everyone. 

Your business blog is one of the most important elements in your online marketing strategy. However, no one wants to waste their valuable time writing weekly blogs that no one sees or cares about.

Enter blog marketing. It’s one of the best moves you can make for your business, and those that jump onboard will quickly see the return on their investment. So what exactly is blog marketing, really? 

Blog marketing is a strategy that grows and scales the impact of your blog. 

The result of this marketing strategy is a business blog that is now a more effective individual marketing asset within your specific annual strategy.

The first step to creating an effective business blog is to think differently about the role it plays in the first place.

Rethink the Role of Your Business Blog

Blog marketing used to mean using your blog to market your business. Your blog was part of your galaxy of marketing assets – email, social media, landing pages, and so forth. Like a planet, it circled around your business.

Now, shift your thinking and place your blog at the center of its own galaxy.  Give this galaxy its own planets – email, social media, landing pages, SEO, analytics etc. This first step alone has drastically increased the impact of your blog. As the center of its own marketing galaxy, your blog is now positioned to grow and scale. It has greater potential to increase traffic, and convert that traffic into leads and customers.

At Midwest Marketing, we implemented a blog marketing strategy which now generates 67% of our overall monthly leads. Pretty impressive, and a completely achievable task for our partners.

The 3 Steps of Blog Marketing

There are three critical steps in blog marketing.

1) Get Your Blog Discovered – This is all about attracting brand new readers and traffic to your blog. By targeting long tail keywords that are geared towards search engines, organic traffic will be able to easily find your blog and your website. Additionally, your blog must be updated on a regular, weekly basis. No one will continue visiting a site that is stagnant and outdated. 

2) Convert Visitors into Subscribers – Once they’ve arrived, you want to convert visitors into subscribers – the kind that keeps coming back. By doing so, you can begin to establish a relationship with your subscribers. They’ll start to consider you an industry expert, and you’ll remain top of mind when it’s time for them to purchase products and services.

3) Leveraging Evangelists – Your current subscribers all come with their own networks. Turn your subscribers into evangelists, tap into their networks and start attracting a new audience. If a faithful reader shares your blog post on one of their social media profiles, their friends will in turn see the post as well. More exposure inevitably leads to more loyal subscribers!

Think about these 3 steps as part of a continual cycle that can benefit both your business and the outlook of your readers.  Step 3, leveraging evangelists, brings people around to Step 1, blog discovery. These new readers turn into subscribers and eventually into evangelists that bring in new readers, and so on and so forth.

The Importance of the Idea

Writing fantastic blog content that keeps readers coming back all starts with the right idea. It doesn’t matter how well written your blog post may be. Ultimately, if the idea falls flat, so will your efforts.

Coming up with the right idea is like a formula. The “subject” plus the “angle” has to equal an idea that intrigues, interests and engages your readers with relevant subject. Unfortunately, too many business bloggers write for search engines. To them an “idea” is really a set of business keywords.

While keywords certainly should be a part of a business blogging strategy, it shouldn’t be the primary focus. Keywords will not help you generate great ideas that engage and take your business blog to the next level. Keyword blogging is like bunting in baseball.  You might get on base, but you’ll get no further than first. Plus, few people remember the bunts.

Rather, you want to think “big hit” – content that people can’t help but click on, read, and share with others in their social networks.

In Conclusion

Maintaining an effective blog marketing strategy requires a great deal of time, energy, and experience. A blog writer must know how to utilize the correct balance of keyword strategy and engaging, informative content that entices readers.

At Midwest Marketing, we don’t expect our clients to perform these tasks singlehandedly. That’s why we employ a team of professional copy writers who understand how to create content that people love. To establish an effective blog marketing strategy for your own business, contact Midwest Marketing today.