@ET-DC@eyJkeW5hbWljIjp0cnVlLCJjb250ZW50IjoicG9zdF90aXRsZSIsInNldHRpbmdzIjp7ImJlZm9yZSI6IiIsImFmdGVyIjoiIn19@
News flash, blogs are back in style. But they’re not just for journaling or sharing sage advice. Blogs are now one of the most affordable, accessible, and effective marketing tools you can implement for your business whether you’re a fresh-faced startup or seasoned veteran. We’ve written more generally about how having a blog on your site can boost your business, but if you’re looking for hard data, these numbers speak for themselves.
Here are 5 figures that will convince you to start your business blog asap:
“
Blogs are now one of the most affordable, accessible, and effective marketing tools you can implement for your business.
1 | Businesses that blog receive 126% more leads than businesses that don’t.
Stat via Lyfe Marketing.
This likely boils down to several factors:
1: Blogs increase your credibility and foster trust among your target customer base.
Studies show that 81% of users in the US consider blogs as credible sources of information. What’s more, 60% are likely to judge a business positively if they have custom content (like a blog) on their website. If your visitors see you as trustworthy and credible, they’re more likely to reach out or request to be contacted.
2: If your blogs are consistent and provide useful information, people will want to see more.
You can collect leads from people seeking updates from you in the future. Implementing a newsletter is a great way to collect leads for email marketing, and it’s typically a smaller ask than gathering sales leads directly.
3: Blogs increase the visibility of your website, bringing in more people seeking your services.
Statistically, you’ll capture a higher percentage of leads if those people were searching for your service to start with. (We explain how blogs boost visibility in the next tip.)
Bottom line:
More client engagement = Increased lead generation.
2 | Well-maintained blogs generate up to 436% more indexed pages for their company websites.
Stat via Hubspot.
Maybe you have a degree in internet technology, or maybe you still struggle with the concept of a series of tubes. We don’t know how much you know, so here’s a quick rundown in case these terms are all Greek to you: when a search engine like Google looks at a page on your website, it’s crawling for information. When it crawls your page and commits data to memory for future use, it’s indexing. Search engines use indexed data to determine where your links should show up in searches by real people. The more indexed pages your site has, the more chances you’ll have to appear in different search results, and the more visible you become to potential customers searching for your services.
Every blog post creates a new page to be indexed, and it tells crawlers that your site is active and updating frequently, so they’re more likely to see you as credible. If you have a good company managing your site’s Search Engine Optimization (SEO), your pages will be optimized for specific keywords that fit your business, so all that data being indexed is working in your favor to essentially build your credit worthiness with Google for prime placement in results. If you’re blogging smart (or having the same SEO company manage your blog for you), your blogs will target keywords just like your website pages. Changes are you found this particular blog post by searching for keywords related to business, statistics, and blogs. If you found us through Google, we did our job well!
Bottom line:
More indexed pages = More credit with search engines = Better ranking in search results.
3 | Businesses that blog receive 97% more links to their site and content.
Stat via Liquid Capital Corp.
Successful page indexing is only part of the SEO equation. Backlinks are essential to growing your website’s footprint and credibility. Backlinks are established anytime another site posts a link to a page on your website. The value of the backlink is all about how credible the site is that’s doing the linking.
If Forbes links to you in a post, that’s a huge boon to your SEO since Forbes is a highly credible site. If you post a link to your website on your LinkedIn profile, it’s also credible because it correlates with your location and position at the company. Blogging earns backlinks primarily from other blogs, and from social media posts.
If you post consistent, quality content, people will pass it on and your backlinks will grow. If you prove that you’re publishing reliable content (and remember that 81% of users trust what they’re reading in your blog!) other sites may list you as a resource for your field. Backlinks can be an expensive aspect of SEO if you’re seeking them cold, but blogs can earn backlinks simply by existing.
Bottom Line:
Consistent blog posts = Popular content getting passed along = More Backlinks established for your SEO efforts.
4 | Blogs can increase traffic to your business website by 55%.
Stat via Hubspot.
If you’re showing up more in search results and earning links from other sites, it makes sense you’ll see a boost in traffic to your site. Search Engine Optimization is the number one way to ensure your website is visible and accessible to your potential clients, and blogging is the most affordable way to get started.
Once your SEO is working for you, this is when you can really start capitalizing on your traffic and collecting leads. You will see the biggest return with a website that is designed well and optimized for collecting leads, so if you’re concerned that your site could use some work, it’s worth investing in some site maintenance or even a redesign if necessary before implementing your blog. Providing a seamless experience will improve your metrics across the board.
Bottom line:
Better SEO = More traffic to your website = More leads.
5 | SEO leads have a 14.7% close rate, compared to only 1.7% for outbound leads.
Stat via Digital Marketing Institute.
Outbound leads include more traditional methods like print advertising or email marketing. SEO leads come from people who searched something online and happened to see your website pop up in the results So why do SEO leads have a larger margin of success? Because your new customers were searching for your product or service online instead of picking up a flier or reading junk emails!
If someone is Googling “Same day carpet cleaning near me,” they have a clear intent to buy, and buy fast. They aren’t searching fruitlessly for a brochure tucked on their windshield last month, they’re standing over a spilled glass of wine with phone in hand, frantically searching for a solution.
Whoever shows up in those search results is undoubtedly getting their business. If you’re a carpet cleaning company, you hope it’s you, but ultimately it’s your SEO that determines if you’re in the top 3 links or buried on page 15 of the results. Blogs boost your SEO, convince customers of your trustworthiness, and help them find your site online.
Bottom line: You need a business blog!
Blogs contribute to SEO through backlinks, indexing and keywords, and they build customer trust in your business. It’s recommended to blog weekly at minimum (although posting twice a week can yield up to 3.5x more traffic), with optimum post length rated around 1,600 words.
If that sounds like a lot, it certainly can be, especially a few months down the line when you’re running dry on topics to write about. If you have the marketing budget to spare, it’s worth looking into blog management services—people who will write quality content, target relevant keywords, and establish a consistent posting schedule so your newsletter recipients receive frequent updates.
We write and publish our own content at Red Arrow Marketing, so if you’re interested in how we do it, get in touch with us and we’ll gladly field any questions!
That’s it for this week’s Red Arrow Blog. If you found these resources useful, let us know below! And be sure to follow our social media for weekly articles to help you make the most of your business. Craving more blog stats? SeoTribunal compiled a list of 58 stats, including these highlights and more.
Facebook – Red Arrow Marketing
Twitter – @redarrowagency
Instagram – @redarrowmarketing
