By now, you’ve heard that consistent blogging is key to the success of your marketing efforts. Blogging provides ample SEO benefits, educational information for potential and current customers, and topics to promote on social media.
Well, if blogging is so important, why do so many businesses fail to do it? There’s a long list of possible excuses, and the most common one we hear is, “Where do I even begin?” Staring at a blank page is daunting even for experienced writers—but there’s hope! By following a formula and taking a few quick steps to prepare your blogs, generating content can become a breeze.
Step 1: Know your audience.
Before you can create compelling content, you need to know what will pique the interest of your audience. Consider what you know about your current customers and the customers you’ve yet to reach. Their interests should be the topics of your blog posts.
Try making buyer personas for your company. These include the likes and dislikes, demographics, and other basic information about each group of customers you cater to. For example, a restaurant may have a buyer persona for the family-oriented customer, the late-night millennial, and someone who would request catering. Next, you can seek out topics that would interest these persons.
Step 2: Start with a single topic.
Before you begin writing, you need to choose a single, specific topic. You can start with something broad and then narrow it down. A well-defined topic allows you to use more specific keywords and maintain the attention of your reader. For example, a law firm may want to write about employment law. From employment law, you can narrow it down to workplace harassment, and then further to workplace harassment policies. There you have it: What You Need to Know About Workplace Harassment Policies.
Step 3: Organize your outline.
Once you have your topic, you can write an outline of everything you want to include. An outline is great for organizing your thoughts and content, which makes the blog easier to read and more useful for the reader. It’s best to organize content in a way that isn’t intimidating for the reader. A long wall of text is daunting and hard to read. Instead, you can break up your content into sections. This blog is a great example!
Step 4: Start writing!
The next step is to do the real work of writing your content. If you’ve completed a thorough outline, then this should be a breeze. As you write, keep in mind what you want the reader to take from your blog. We’ve talked about keeping up with your readers’ interests, but you also want your reader to take a message from the blog, as well. Promoting your message can be subtle. A simple way is to include a call to action at the end of your blog.
Don’t let your website fall flat by neglecting content marketing and blogging. Studio Brand Collective offers content generation and full-service digital marketing packages for small- to medium-sized businesses. Request an audit of your website’s content today.
