blogging

I had a conversation today with a client who asked if I could email her reasons why their business should blog. She needed to share this info with her boss, so that her boss would “buy-in” to the whole blogging idea. Seeing how blogging has helped me and my business, I’m a true believer. So of course I was very ecstatic to give her all my reasons.

Here is some of what I told her:

You’re the Expert.
Blogging helps to position yourself and your company as the thought leader of your business.This is true regardless if you own a tiny shoe repair shop, or a mega-corporation.

Build Client Relationship
Blogs are a great way to receive feedback from your customers, provide tips, and gain insight into what your customers really want.

Find Employees
Daily readers of your blog pay attention to what you have to say. Chances are they enjoy reading your blog and look forward to your posts. What better way to attract some of those readers as loyal employees.

Rank High on Search Engines
Yes, blogs do help you achieve high keyword rankings on search engines. Blogs tend to get indexed much faster than websites do. Search engines, especially Google, enjoy fresh content. Blogs associated with your website are a great way to update content frequently.

Do you own a blog? What has your experience been?

I’ve been a fan of Aaron Wall of SEOBook.com for a few years now. I’m an avid reader (and watcher) of his blogs. While I knew that video blogging (or vlogs) have grown in popularity over the years, I never really thought of using them myself until recently.

As most of my readers know, I’m in the process of making my SEO Consulting business official. That is, I’m working on developing a business plan and getting all my ducks in a row (an actual website is one of those ducks). In the process of doing so, I’ve obviously have been doing a ton of research relating to all the boring details of business plans (demographics, market research, competitor analysis, taxes, etc.).

In the midst of my research, I found myself landing upon vlog after vlog. Then it dawned on me, since video blogging is such a great vehicle for driving a ton of traffic to a site in a short period of time, why not integrate vlogs into the SEO mix for small businesses.

My initial thought was to use vlogs the same way we use press releases (or in conjunction with a press release). Say for example, you’re a small business and you’re opening a new location – one would normally send out a press release, right? Well, why not also make a video blog post about the new location, show it off in your video, highlight the benefits, and maybe give tips to others in your industry who are also considering an expansion. Post both the press release and the vlog on your site (fully SEO optimized, of course), and watch the traffic pour in. Add an immediate call to action on each landing page, and there ya go, SEO success!