Blogging: A Valuable and Powerful Way to Build a Strong Brand

With more than half the world’s population now having access to the Internet, more consumers are choosing to go online for their needs. Whether it’s to actually make purchases or research on brands they can trust, a strong online presence has become crucial for a business to succeed. It is this need that has given birth to Search Engine Optimization or SEO. In simple terms, this is the process of building a reputation online to get a higher ranking.

According to Search Engine Journal, a trusted online resource on SEO, over 90% of internet users start their browsing experience with search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo. They trust these search engines to provide them with trustworthy results. This is why getting ranked higher is so important because consumers often just check out businesses on the first 2 pages of the results. SEO brings your business closer to consumers. And every business owner knows just how important it is to be able to call attention to your brand.

There are various SEO strategies that a business can use. But one of the simplest but effective ways is optimizing keywords. When a consumer launches a search, he or she does this by typing words associated with what they need. These are known as keywords. For example, if a consumer needs carpet cleaning services, they use ‘carpet’, ‘cleaning’ and ‘services’ to find who to hire. 

Search engines take these keywords and check all the websites for ones that have the most relevant content. Reputable sites that have matching content (without being too much) are delivered to the consumer. These are the company’s that get a chance to win the customer’s businesses.

Keywords are a way to get a foot through the door. And the best way to optimize this strategy is through blogging.

Blogging is an organic way to improve your ranking at Search Engine Results Page (SERP). According to an article in Search Engine Watch, an online resource on SEO, content marketing is one of the most effective ways to drive traffic to your brand. It does so by doing the following,

Provides your site with the sufficient number of keywords needed to meet the algorithms set by search engines
Builds consumer interest and confidence with the free and relevant content
Helps you build a better relationship with your target market
Gives you more indexed pages that affect your ranking

Blogging also gives your brand more integrity as an industry leader. Well written blogs that show your business’ expertise puts your company in a better light with consumers. It’s a direct way to tell the market that you certainly know what you’re doing.

Not all blogs are equal. This is a fact that you need to remember when thinking about adding blogs to your site. It is essential that these are relevant and written well. Below are some tips to help you out,

Captivating Intro’s – Remember that you are vying for the attention of a consumer who has dozens of other blogs to check out. You want to catch their interest so they stay and read the rest of your content. This is why you need to make sure you have headlines that deliver results.

You can use online tools such as Analyzers to evaluate how your headlines or introductions will fare. An example of this is CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer. It helps you see how much impact your title will have on prospective customers.

Optimized Content – Blogs are so much more than free content. Sure, you want your prospects to find it interesting and engaging. But you also want to make sure that it is visible in the World Wide Web.

You can do this by maximizing the keywords that you use. Make sure these are found in the right places such as titles, meta descriptions, and anchor texts. You also want to make sure that you don’t overdo it. Search engines tend to look poorly at keyword stuffing.

Choose Keywords wisely – Before you start writing your blog, make sure you pick a keyword that can produce results. You certainly do not want to be optimizing one that doesn’t get used too often online. There are numerous online tools that you can use to research relevant keywords that you can use.

Once upon a time, blogging was simply an online diary for people who want to share their thoughts and ideas. Nowadays, it is a means to market your business to create a stronger online brand.  But this only works if done right.