Blogging: the Achilles Heel of all business owners from lead generation to eCommerce.
For retail business owners, it’s simple enough to brush off blogging as an unimportant, non-issue. You’re all about increasing sales and offering stellar customer service.
Writing blogs about how to wear high-fashion biker boots in autumn is kind of a low priority when you’re trying to make sales.
However, most eCommerce business owners don’t realise there’s a link between getting more traffic onto their website and achieving more sales. When business owners focus all their time attempting to convert customers, it’s not uncommon to see traffic start to drop which, in turn, can cause a dip in sales.
Blogs are the perfect solution to building a following online and increase the number of customers engaging with your brand or business. We’ve seen major success stories from blogging here at Gorilla – for example, this blog was posted on February 8th, 2019. These are results just a week later!
Want to get in on this action?
You might remember our article on the “dos” and “don’ts” of eCommerce blogging – well, we’re about to take things to the next level. In this blog, we’re going to explain WHY you should be blogging in 2019, so you can take those tips and use them for the good of your business.
#1. Blogs = more pages + more opportunities to rank for relevant keywords
Quick maths.
When it comes to SEO, the more valuable, informative pages on your website, the more opportunities you have to rank for keywords relevant to your brand or business.
Let me break it down a little further.
Most online businesses have the basic information pages to run effectively: the homepage, “about us”, “contact us”, product categories, brand categories and more.
While the homepage, product and brand pages can be optimised to help customers find your business in Google’s search results, there are more high-value opportunities just waiting to take advantage of in the realm of blogging.
Blogs provide endless opportunities to rank for alternative or secondary keywords related to your business… meaning you can appear more often in search results, making it easier for potential customers to find your store.
For example, Dermstore sells makeup, face wash, face masks and skin scrubs online. Their website is optimised for a wide range of shopping-related terms like “beauty products online”, “botanical skincare” and “skincare website” as well as branded terms like “Sunday Riley”, “Dermablend” and “Nuface”.
Customers aren’t messing around when they use these kinds of keywords. They’re already well down the sales funnel – they know what they want and they’re damn well going to get it online.
However, there are thousands of broader, more informational phrases and keywords out there waiting to be taken advantage of. For example, Dermstore could appear for “benefits of coffee scrubs” or “scrub for your skin type” and target potential customers who are looking for resources and advice before purchasing a product.
So, Dermstore started a blog. Check this out.
We searched “best scrub for your skin type” and Dermstore was the first eCommerce result to pop up.
As you can see, the page title is optimised for “skin type” and “exfoliate” which is a variation of the term “scrub”. After clicking through to the blog, we’re presented with images of suggested products and an explanation of their benefits for specific skin types, all the while linking through to make the shopping experience more informed and streamlined
Like Dermstore, you could be appearing for hundreds of broader queries and keywords, exposing your brand and business to thousands of potential customers looking for help or resources about specific products. Who knows – the right advice might push them to add a few things to the cart!
#2. Blogs are the ammunition you need to get noticed online
From bloggers to like-minded businesses and social media, all link signals are good signs to Google. Link signals tell search engines your business is the business – the one people want to see; the one people love.
When sharing mentions of your website on social media, there is a delicate tightrope to walk on. You can’t share your homepage all the time because it’s just not relevant to your audience, and there are only so many times you can post about products without sounding repetitive.
Nope. Can’t be done.
Boring.
Boresville.
It’s all well and good to share content on social media to impress Google but to get the most out of social media (and sales), you’re going to need to focus on impressing customers with your creativity, authoritativeness, and content creation skills.
Blogs are perfect for social sharing. Blogs provide more material to work with on Facebook, Instagram and even Twitter, plus blogs and list articles have proven to be super popular with social media users. The graph below shows what content customers are most interested in and most likely to share.
Customers will be more engaged and interested in posts – who doesn’t love a list post, tutorial or quiz to scroll through in their lunch break? Plus, if your customers like what you’re working with, they might even be inclined to share your blogs on their own pages… free advertising, anyone?
Your blogs could spread like wildfire.
Hello, new traffic!
With more traffic coming to your site, you have the perfect opportunity to capture their email address. Create an enticing offer to new customers in exchange for an email address, and send them to a welcome series email flow.
You can thank us later for the extra dollars in your back pocket.
#3. Updating and refreshing old blogs can have a huge impact on traffic
If you have an existing blog page but don’t have time to upload blogs regularly, you can still improve the amount of traffic coming through to your store by updating old blogs with new content and proven SEO strategies.
This process can take just a few minutes to complete!
Brian Dean, the expert digital marketer behind SEO Bible, Backlinko, saw a 50% increase in traffic to his website within a week – just from updating one of his old blogs on optimising YouTube.
Here’s a quick guide to updating and upgrading old blog posts, according to the reigning king of SEO, Brian Dean:
- #1. Find out-of-date blogs on your website (that are still generating a decent amount of traffic);
- #2. Update old screenshots and videos to the latest data. Add infographics and videos if possible – this has been proven to increase engagement. Check out the graph in section two for more proof!
- #3. Eliminate elements of the blog that aren’t working e.g. videos and images that no longer appear or exist;
- #4. If videos are used, consider adding transcripts to increase the word count on the page. Around 200-300 words per page is ideal;
- #5. Click save and publish the new page!
Google takes note of when website owners update their website. It’s called query deserves freshness (QDF), meaning the freshest, newest content is going to pack more weight or punchiness when it comes to getting ranked by Google.
The people want to see “new”, people – get on it!
Brian’s recommendation here ensures all blogs on your website stay fresh and relevant for Google while providing the newest information for your customers.
You don’t need to publish a brand new blog on every out-of-date topic – just update the page and make sure to share it again on social media!
A blog post paints a thousand words… and dollars in sales
Sometimes, Google Ads, SEO and link building can only take your sales so far. If you’ve found your eCommerce store has hit a plateau of both traffic and sales, it might be time to consider alternative strategies like blogging.
Blogging provides endless opportunities to rank for medium and long-term keywords, like “western boots in winter” and “cricket bat size guide”. The more valuable, engaging pages you have on your website, the better, as you’ll have more opportunities to make yourself seen online.
Plus, Google recognises when you’ve been active on your website and the newer, more engaging content you publish, the better.
Google knows when you’ve been sleeping.
She knows when you’re awake…
Anyway, enough of that.
Blogging isn’t something a lot of business owners have spare time to do. Luckily, your local gorillas are blog-writing geniuses! Get in touch with the Gorilla 360 team for assistance with blogging on your website, or contact us for more information and training on writing Google-friendly and people-friendly blogs.
