Does your Small Business Really Need a Blog?

Okay, so let’s imagine you own a small company called Deliverbrie. You provide an artisan cheese and cracker subscription service, and ship monthly boxes straight to your customer’s doors. You set up shop four years ago, and though your passion lies in making cheddar, you’ve enthusiastically schooled yourself in every aspect of business, from sourcing financiers, to placing online adverts. Branding, you know, is crucial to success, which is why you hired SO Marketing to build your website, paid us to photograph your products, and appointed that intern to do your social media. You think you’ve cracked it. And then someone utters those dreaded words, ‘Don’t you think you should have a blog?’

Unfortunately, there’s no easy answer to this. Blogs, in the marketing world, are contentious things, and there are compelling arguments on both sides of the line. Suggesting that every washing machine company, taxi service and corner shop should have an online blog can provoke more than a few eye rolls, but actually, all of these businesses would benefit from one. If you’re still undecided, allow us to weigh up the pros and cons…

When you should set up a blog
If you want to grow your business
Here’s a little-known fact: Google ranks webpages, not websites, so the more blogs you have hitting different search terms, the more likely you are to pop up on someone’s radar. To increase your chances of catching new customers in your (web) net, divide your business into its component areas, and then blog about them. For example, if you own a clothing company, then you could maybe write about ‘the ethics of fast fashion’, ‘cotton vs polyester’ and ‘how to build a capsule wardrobe’, as well as your own product lines. The more niche your posts, the more SEO terms you’ll be hitting, and the larger your chances of climbing up the Google ladder.

If you want to be seen as an expert in your field
Let’s face it, no-one is going to be as enthusiastic about your business idea as you, and if you’re selling moisturiser, then chances are that you know a lot about moisturiser. Customers won’t necessarily share your passion, but if they’re buying skincare products off you, then they’ll certainly want to know how passionate you are. The brutal truth about business blogs is that a lot of them aren’t read all that much, but it’s still vital that they’re there. They promote expertise, which in turn, promotes trust, and nothing is more crucial to a business’s success than trust.

When you shouldn’t bother with a blog
If you’ll just churn out second rate content
The only thing more damaging to a business than no marketing is bad marketing, and a blog that is poorly researched, full of typos, or only gets updated twice a year is definitely bad marketing. If you’re not a natural writer (and how many entrepreneurs are?) or you simply don’t have dedicated time to set aside, then consider hiring someone else to do it. It’s better value than you think, and best of all, it’ll be one aspect of promotion that you don’t have to deal with. Naturally, SO Marketing can help.

If you’re not going to do anything with them
Writing a blog that you don’t promote is like buying a big-old Harley Davison that you polish everyday, only to keep it in the garage under a dust-cover. It’s time-consuming, expensive to maintain, and if you don’t show it off once in a while, then honestly, what’s the point? Writing blog posts is hard – you have to research the area, decide upon your SEO terms, and keep your brand’s tone-of-voice in mind as you figure out what might be entertaining for your audience, but sharing them makes it all worthwhile. You can use your blogs as answers to customer’s questions on social media, and promote them using blogger hashtags on Instagram. So please, if you’ve put in the work, then at the very least make sure you reap the rewards!

SO Marketing provides expert marketing solutions to all sorts of businesses, big or small. If you’re thinking about blogging, but don’t know where to start, then contact us for a cozy consultation. It might be better value than you think.