Top 10 Business to Business Blog Tips
It has become widely accepted that businesses should blog and many businesses have integrated blogging into their marketing strategy. Blogging has become established as a popular marketing tool because it can help improve search engine rankings on business websites.
The advantages of business blogging for SEO are threefold, 1) business websites that are traditionally content poor can steadily grow unique content, 2) blogs can be used to strengthen keyword targeting and keyword breath, 3) well written blog content is more likely to attract links, social sharing and conversation than other business website pages. The benefits of an effective blogging strategy include: sales, lead and referral generation, better B2B or B2B communication, development of authority, credibility and visibility and easy access to honest feedback.
However, the rise of blogging as an SEO tool has opened the flood gates for blogging malpractice. There are countless examples of businesses failing to effectively leverage their blog. Worse still, some businesses are investing time and money into a blog that is working against their business goals. With that in mind, here are 10 top tips for business to business blogs that will help you avoid the pitfalls of business to business blogging and get the most from your blogging activity.
- Post regularly
- Use copywriting best practices
- Promote your blog content
- Link to relevant sources in each post (internal and external)
- Write eye catching headlines
- Write for your audience
- Install Google Analytics
- Use Google Analytics to improve your blog
- Use mixed media such as video, photography and slideshows
- Remember the blogging is a social activity
The most common mistake businesses make is failure to keep their blog up-to-date by blogging regularly. If your business blog isn’t regularly updated it will reflect badly on your business and make you look unprofessional or no longer active. When setting out your blogging strategy put a blog writing schedule in place and stick to it.
Writing a blog post isn’t the same as news articles or press releases. The tone should be informal, friendly, personal and most importantly, conversational. If you’re unfamiliar with blog copywriting styles read a few of the more successful blogs in your niche and get a feel for the writing style. One of the primary goals of each blog post should be to stimulate conversation.
Quick tip: Ask a question towards the end of the post.
Blogging and social media should have a symbiotic relationship. Promote your social media accounts on your blog and your blog posts on your social media accounts. Use Facebook, Twitter, RSS and email subscriptions to build your audience. If you don’t already have social media profiles, set them up.
When referencing your products/services, related posts and information or assets from external sources provide a link back to them. It’s good for your audience and will help avoid any legal issues that may arise from failing to providing the correct sourcing for assets and information.
Your headline should be descriptive and eye catching. The goal of the article headline is to sum up the content of the article and draw readers in. Try to keep the length of article headlines to no more than 50 characters and make the most of them. Most blogging platforms use the article title for the title tag. It’s one of the most important on page ranking factors for SEO so ensure you include the keywords the blog post is targeted to rank for.
This may seem an obvious point but the rise of the blog as an SEO tool sparked the rise of blogging for SEO instead of blogging for your audience. Blogging activity is most effective when it stimulates inbound links, social sharing and citation from bloggers in the same niche. If you write for search engines it’s very unlikely your blog posts will gain any traction. You may find it difficult to write interesting articles in the business to business space but with a little thought and creativity it’s very rare there isn’t something great to write about.
Google Analytics is a powerful web analytics tool and it’s free. It’s easy to install on most popular blogging platforms and provides a wealth of information about your visitors, how they got to the blog, which blog posts are most popular and much more. Not only will you be able to monitor the success of your blogging activity, you’ll be able to improve your blogging strategy moving forward.
When Google Analytics has been accumulating data for a week or more you’ll be able to use the data to further improve your blogging strategy. For example, if there is a particular subject that has generated a lot of interest, blog about it again. Experiment with the design of your blog to display the most popular posts to make it easier for visitors to find them. When you have great data at your fingertips the options are endless.
Blog articles don’t have to be text based; try video, photography, infographics and slideshows. Infographics are particularly popular but video, photography and slideshows are also more likely to be shared via social media and social bookmarking websites than a text-based article.
Treat your blog as a hub for social media activity, sharing information and conversation. Always respond to comments and feedback. If someone helps promote your blog thank them for taking the time to do so.
