Creating A High Value Blog Strategy
Blogging consistently and strategically can elevate your business.
They say that there are no certainties in life aside from death and taxes. If I had to add one more, though, it would be the value of a good business blog. Data from Hubspot clearly supports this, with a recent study showing how companies that blog earn three times more organic traffic[i] than those that don鈥檛. But before you jump into blogging, it鈥檚 always wise to put a strong strategy in place to ensure you gain maximum value. Let’s look at what this entails.
1.) Decide on your blog鈥檚 goal
A successful blog starts with a clear goal. While every company is different, most businesses focus their blog on providing education and resources to their target audience. Title companies would be well advised to do the same. By delivering valuable content that educates your audiences on topics meaningful to them, you will raise your brand鈥檚 reputation. Better yet, you will be seen as a trusted resource that stakeholders can turn to in times of need.
2.) Develop your content
Next, start planning the content you will create. As a title agency, your stakeholders include realtors, attorneys, home buyers and more. This gives you a wealth of topics to draw from to create educational blogs and other resources. The importance of title insurance, industry cybersecurity concerns or agent/realtor partnerships could all serve as great topics to build content around. Whatever you write, always keep your content laser-focused on solving problems for your target audience.
3.) Make a plan with a content calendar
It is not uncommon for a business blog to get neglected in the hustle and bustle of running an agency. You can avoid this problem by deploying a simple content calendar. Content calendars assist with keeping your content development efforts on track and ensuring a consistent posting cadence. They allow businesses to easily track what type of content is going out to which audience, while facilitating internal alignment, consensus and accountability.
4.) Vary your content mixture
When building out your blogging strategy, vary the type of content assets you are creating to foster greater reach and engagement amongst your audience. You have probably heard the expression that 鈥渁 picture is worth a thousand words,鈥� and that holds true with marketing. While pure text blogs are a must-have for agencies, data shows that assets like infographics and especially videos are far more effective in connecting with digital-first audiences. If creating visual content isn’t feasible, add variety with text-based formats like FAQs, listicles, and how-to guides.
5.) Optimize for SEO and readability
Remember to optimize your blog content for both search engines AND human readers. Obviously, this can be a tricky balance to strike, but it is not impossible if you adhere to the following tips:
- Headlines: Your headline is one of the most important parts of your blog. Use primary keywords within the title text and keep it as clear, concise and compelling as possible to ensnare readers.
- Paragraph structure: Aim for no more than four sentences and use subheadings to create a logical flow for both search engines and human readers.\
- Subheadings: Further increase your SEO by utilizing secondary or tertiary keywords in subheadings, which can also break up blogs for readers by making them more scannable.
- Images: Don鈥檛 forget to align your images with SEO best practices by creating optimized ALT text descriptions. And double-check that your images are of high enough quality to engage readers but not too large where they slow down a blog鈥檚 load time.
6.) Metrics are your blog鈥檚 best friend
As you begin to publish, keep a close eye on your metrics to continually refine your strategy. Most mainstream blogging platforms offer robust analytics to provide valuable insights. This data is invaluable for those wanting to know the ideal time to post, where their audience is coming from, and which articles are resonating.
It鈥檚 blogging time!
In a world where marketing trends are always changing, blogging continues to be a great tool for businesses wanting a low-cost way to connect with customers and build a positive brand reputation. However, like any marketing effort, your blog needs a solid strategy to succeed. From setting your initial goal to keeping a close eye on metrics, getting a blog up and running requires several steps. Once you implement these steps, the rewards will be well worth the effort.
Tags: blogging, digital marketing, marketing strategy