A blog - or weblog - may seem to you to be simply a computerized journal that some publish on the web for all to read, but it has become a mainstream form of journalism which can encompass anything from personal reflections to opinions on current events. Today, even our presidential candidates employ bloggers to assist with their campaigns as part of their overall marketing strategy. Adding a blog to your business website is a great way to increase your sites traffic, thus getting - and keeping - more business customers.
Including a blog on your website can definitely help your search engine rankings. Search engine 'spiders' continually crawl the web looking for new content, and sites which are regularly updated are apt to attract more attention - and thus better rankings - than websites which don't change over time. By regularly updating your content, your site visitors will have more reasons to return to your website again and again, rather than just once. Adding a blog with a program such as WordPress is much easier for most business owners than to upload new content to your website on a regular basis.
So what could you write in a blog? Well, for a small business, writing about your personal reflections or activities isn't doing much to attract those search engine spiders - or your customers - but there are as many theme-related topics as there are small business. For example, if you own a pizzeria, your blog entries may include a series of short articles about tossing pizza dough- everything from an entry about tossing techniques to a series of stories about funny dough-tossing mishaps. You could also include entries with favorite recipes, or links to great destinations in Italy. The possibilities are endless!
To get started, ask your website designer to include a blog on your site, and brainstorm about ideas to write about. Perhaps you've noticed certain business stories which you enjoy telling, or you notice which facts about your line of work people are most interested in. Make a commitment to post regularly to your blog, or your site visitors will be disappointed. You can write your entries when time permits - even several at once, if you see them as a series - and than just space out your postings of them to keep your readers coming back for more. When you first begin a blog, it is a good idea to post several entries in quick succession - like one or two a day for a few days - to attract the attention of the search engines, and after that, just be sure not to forget about it! You may even find a new hobby in creative writing. Happy Blogging!