28 Feb
It may come as a surprise to you that the majority of e-commerce websites do not have a business blog. While there are a lot of sources that speak to why general businesses should have a blog, very little has been targeted at e-commerce sites. What is the point of having a blog when your primary objective is to set up shop online?
It is no secret that business blogs do a lot for increasing online traffic to standard website platforms, but they also have several other benefits that specifically benefit e-commerce sites. What is even better is the fact that because many e-commerce sites are not taking advantage of having a business blog, this can be the one aspect that sets your site away from the rest.
Blogging will set your e-commerce site apart from your competitors and with time, building up content may help you advance in a way that serves both your business and customers.
What is a blog?
A blog is a shortened version of “weblog” is an online journal or informational website displaying information in reverse chronological order, with the latest posts appearing first, at the top. It is a platform where a writer or a group of writers share their views on an individual subject.
What is the purpose of a blog?
There are many reasons to start a blog for personal use and only a handful of strong ones for business blogging. Blogging for business, projects, or anything else that might bring you money has a very straightforward purpose – to rank your website higher in Google SERPs, a.k.a. increase your visibility.
As a business, you rely on consumers to keep buying your products and services. As a new business, you rely on blogging to help you get to potential consumers and grab their attention. Without blogging, your website would remain invisible, whereas running a blog makes you searchable and competitive.
So, the main purpose of a blog is to connect you to the relevant audience. Another one is to boost your traffic and send quality leads to your website.
The more frequent and better your blog posts are, the higher the chances for your website to get discovered and visited by your target audience. This means that a blog is an effective lead generation tool. Add a great call to action (CTA) to your content, and it will convert your website traffic into high-quality leads. A blog also allows you to showcase your niche authority and build a brand.
When you use your niche knowledge for creating informative and engaging posts, it builds trust with your audience. Great blogging makes your business look more credible, which is especially important if your brand is still young and fairly unknown. It ensures presence online and niche authority at the same time.
What is a blog structure?
The appearance of blogs has changed over time, and these days blogs include a wide variety of items and widgets. However, most blogs still include some standard features and structures. Here are common features that a typical blog will include:
- Header with the menu or navigation bar.
- Main content area with highlighted or latest blog posts.
- Sidebar with social profiles, favorite content, or call-to-action.
- Footer with relevant links like a disclaimer, privacy policy, contact page, etc.
Reasons why every ecommerce site needs blog
1. It helps your site to rank for relevant keywords
Blogging provides ecommerce sites with plenty of SEO benefits, including helping your website to rank for search terms that are most relevant to your products, driving the most revenue. Typically, a content marketing team will perform keyword research using various tools which will help determine the most opportunistic phrases you should be targeting.
Since it’s typically not appropriate for product pages to contain title text such as “which coat should I buy this winter?” a blog gives you the opportunity to also answer important questions for your customers or potential customers. Creating a blog post with a keyword friendly title, along with relevant and beneficial information, gives you a huge advantage of higher rankings that will capture users who may be typing their questions directly into Google’s search engine.
2. You can generate as much content as necessary
Google adores regularly updated content, and typically takes the volume of posts and pages of a website into consideration as a ranking signal when determining your site’s visibility. A blog provides you with the real estate to create as much relevant content as you can manage as a strategy to help boost your rankings. Although you have an unlimited freedom with blogging that you don’t have on product or category pages, it’s important not to spam your readers or the search engine by over-posting as a means to manipulate your rankings. One or two well-written, relevant, engaging, and well-optimized posts per week should be sufficient enough to see improvements.
3. Entice your customers and establish a loyal and engaged online community
When you decide to post regular content that is interesting and relevant to your users, encouraging them to engage with posts in the comments or by sharing on social media, you will quickly develop a loyal online readership that you can use to your advantage. Always responding to blog-related comments, emails or tweets will ensure the conversation keeps flowing, enticing readers to return often for more great content. This also gives you a secondary opportunity to respond to any widespread issues your community or customers might have been experiencing, or make any company announcements quickly and effectively.
4. Assist with internal and external link building
Blogs also give you the opportunity to further boost your SEO by providing a means to build internal and external links from and within your site. Typically one of the most neglected SEO techniques, natural link building is still one of the most effective methods to increase visibility. Spending time increasing links to higher ranking non-competitor websites and linking back to products on your own site will increase your page and site authority, thus improving your ranking on Google and promoting your products on site at the same time.
5. Proves industry expertise
Consumers in the digital age are not only after an efficient online shopping experience, they want to go beyond that. In order to establish trust and the credibility of your business, users want to explore what goes on behind your head office doors, see how the production process runs, and get the company’s opinion on new trends and style.
They also like to read regular industry news, updates, and any charity work or special events you might be involved in as a business. Having a blog allows you to generate interesting expert content, such as how-to’s, news and interviews with your team – thus creating engaging, shareable content that will make you stand out as the voice of authority.
6. Most cost-effective form of eCommerce marketing
Even if your marketing budget is huge, what is the point in blowing it if you don’t need to? Blogs provide businesses with an effective way of producing engaging content that can be shared across social, stimulating an ongoing stream of traffic to your site for very little money. What’s more, you don’t always need to create a constant reel of new content and can usually get away with editing, improving and updating old content, as it’s just as appealing to Google. Plus, content can stay relevant for longer than just a season, thus bringing new visitors to the site without having to lift a finger after you have hit publish.
7. It provides an easy way to promote your products
In addition to adding internal links for SEO, a blog allows an eCommerce business to promote new, featured, and top selling products, or even products that need a “boost” due to a dip in sales. The best content marketers will stylishly place products within informative and useful articles, thus driving consumers to products in need of a push. Since this is one of the more craftier methods of promoting your products, it’s important that the marketer writing the blog has the experience and know-how to pull it off seamlessly.
8. You can be fast to react to news or industry changes
Whether you are offering up pipes, plug sockets or paper on your site, a blog will allow you to react to and comment on changes in your industry with more depth and knowledge for your social media channels. For example, Apple announcing a new iPhone would be the perfect opportunity for a tech shop specializing in iPhone accessories to react on their blog. Not only should you comment on the next big trend, but dig deep and devise unique content that will make you stand out as an expert in what you do. This will create trust in the consumer and your brand’s reputation will skyrocket.
9. Implement brand values and find your voice
There are hundreds of thousands of businesses represented online, and unless you are in a super niche industry, you most likely have a good amount of competition. When you’re fighting to get your voice heard, it’s important to establish a distinct tone and voice which matches your business and brand. This will not only make you unique and memorable, but will help you stake your claim in your industry while showing off your expertise. If you’ve already established your voice on other mediums, such as print advertising or social media, it’s important to carry this throughout your blog posts. Having an amazing copywriter with plenty of experience should be helpful in getting this important nuance just right.
10. Increase traffic to your website
Finally, but probably the most obvious, is the increased traffic your ecommerce site will receive when you’ve introduced a blog. When publishing regular, relevant content to your site, you are giving your customers and potential customers more reasons to visit your site from social media or a Google search.
Blogging will increase overall traffic to your site, which is an important ranking signal for Google. This means that with increased traffic, you have the opportunity to rank better overall. If each blog post is created for a specific audience and has in place the right funnel to drive sales, this increased traffic can steer people to the products you want them to buy. Plus, you’ll have the opportunity to grow your ecommerce store from an average shopping site to an educational hub users will want to visit often.
11. How – to posts can draw new and returning customers to your store
Whatever you sell, chances are there are customers out there looking for tips on how to use it. This is true for everything from skin care products to sports equipment to home improvement supplies. So, give those customers what they’re looking for, and make your how-to and tutorial posts so useful that people will bookmark them and keep coming back to learn more.
12. It can help you grow your site’s email list
You probably already know that your email list is the foundation for effective marketing. If your blog offers content that your customers like and can use, it can help you grow your email list so you can get your exclusive offers, promotions and product news in front of more customers, faster.
You don’t have to use a pop-up box to get people to subscribe, either. Beauty brand Orly takes a less hard-sell approach with a simple, linked call to join their email list at the end of its blog posts, just above its social links.
13. Blog is a great place to share buying guides for more sales growth
Even if your customers aren’t into one particular lifestyle or set of causes, they all want to get the right products no matter what those products are. That’s why buying guides are such popular content on eCommerce blogs.
14. It can help you find your next employee
If your store is growing, you may be looking to hire new employees. Posting job listings on your blog is one way to let your customers know, but what’s even more effective is creating a blog category that shows visitors what your company is like, who works there and why they like it.
Wrap up
Now that you’ve seen the light, and know all of the reasons you should have a blog, it’s time to get started. We know – it requires a lot of hard work, dedication, and man-power to manage, but content marketing is key to any ecommerce business’s success.
If you’re struggling with where to begin, be sure to visit our recent post that features helpful tools for generating great blog topics. Or, if you’re looking for a regimented and structured content plan with the support of a full team, leave us a comment below – we’d be happy to help.
Just remember one thing, blogging is an activity any ecommerce brand will benefit from in the long-term. It’s one of the best ways to boost your website, build your clout, and create a loyal following of repeat customers.