Sometimes I get asked, just what is a blog? A “blog” is a website (or part of a website) that is regularly updated with new articles, thoughts, opinions, etc. You are reading one!

Because of the search engine friendliness of blog software, blogs provide a significant boost to a website, often becoming a primary source of traffic.  You can easily improve your website’s search engine rankings by blogging keyword-rich content.

There are a number of reasons that blogging can be a powerful marketing tool:

• People love fresh, interesting and useful content.
• It’s unlikely that anyone will link to your “About Us” page, but if you write an insightful “top ten” list about your industry, hundreds or thousands of people may link to your blog posting within a matter of days.
• Journalists increasingly look to blogs to get a sense of what’s hot and regularly posting industry-related blog articles can help you generate free media coverage.
• The constant infusion of fresh, keyword-rich content will give your site a boost in the search engines.
• It keeps people coming back to your site for more since you caught their interest once.

Blogging is easy to do poorly, though. Before you start, spend some time reading existing blogs, particularly within your own industry. Think about what you like and dislike about them.

Some quick tips for blogging for the home care market:

• Post regularly, but not obsessively. Once or twice a week is a good pace.
• Try to give each post the same attention you’d give to a magazine article submission.
• Don’t rant, babble or preach unless that is your style and what you are best known to do.
• Avoid getting overly personal. It’s okay to note that your baby was just born, but listing the items you ate for breakfast isn’t appropriate (unless you’re a food critic, of course).
• Get involved with other business bloggers. Exchange ideas and tips.

Some quick tips to help search engine ranking:

• Strive to provide useful, practical content that people will bookmark, Tweet or post on Facebook to alert others, send to their friends, or link to from their own website.
• Provide an RSS feed for your blog.
• Provide easy sharing with your social media sites.
• Use an automatic ping service to spread your blog out to the blogosphere.

Above all, try to present information that is useful and helpful. If your blog isn’t helpful or relevant to your potential customers, there’s no reason for them to get excited about it, regardless of how well you might sell it. As long as you are genuine in your communications and strive to provide truly high-quality information to your target audience, it will be relatively easy to get people to read and respond appropriately.

corecubed specializes in writing and marketing for the home care market, and we can help you build a great business blog, turning what you want to say into a powerful marketing tool.  Contact us to learn more.