We've all been there. We hit publish on our newest blog post and expect shares, likes, and an increase in blog traffic. But instead... nothing.
In most niches, you're competing with hundreds of blogs for the attention of the same readers. You have to create valuable content to be able to stand out and be seen.
It's going to be hard work, but if you put these tips into practice, you'll be on your way to fast tracking organic business growth.
Here’s the obvious one - if your business doesn’t have a blog, it’s time to start one. A blog is a great way to generate important content that your ideal customers are looking for. Many pages of a website are static and don’t attract new traffic to the site.
When was the last time you updated the “About us” or “Services” page on your website? Not for awhile. Creating a blog gives you the ability to continually create valuable content for your prospects. It refreshes your website with new searchable content on a frequent basis.
According to a blog post by HubSpot, 70% of the traffic from their company's blog comes from old blog posts. About 90% of HubSpot's leads come from blog posts that were published months and years ago.
Buyer personas are generalized, fictional characters that encompass the needs, goals and behavioural patterns among your real and ideal customers.
When you have a clear idea of who your customer personas are, you can produce tailored content that is meaningful to them. This bigger impact you make on them, the more inclined they will be to come back for more, subscribe to your blog, share posts with their network and so on.
Now that you know who your ideal clients are, it's time to find out what stage of the journey they’re on.
Grasping the buyer's journey allows you to create the right content for whichever stage your potential customers may be at. Content can range from educational-based, solution-based and decision-based content.
Have you ever searched online for information relating to a challenge you were experiencing and found the advice you were looking for on a company website or blog? You may have thought to yourself “wow, this was written for the exact position I’m currently in.”
This positive experience was possible because the business knew the challenge you were encountering was very common in their personas awareness stage before people become customers. They also realized the value in it for them if they could provide a solution that people could easily find, and intentionally write about topics to reach top of the funnel prospects.
When creating content with the buyer’s journey in mind, it’s also beneficial to think about the different stages of your sales funnel.
In most cases, it’s a three-stage funnel:
Every business is unique and will have their own exclusive buyer personas, buyer's journey and sales funnel. That said, considering these three key inbound marketing tools together creates a quality system for targeted, tailored content.
The more you blog, the more traffic you will see on your website. HubSpot found that companies that publish 16+ blog posts a month see almost 3.5 times more traffic than companies that publish 0-4 posts.
Additionally, companies that publish 16+ monthly blog posts receive 4.5 times more leads than companies that post 0-4.
Making the commitment to post fresh content on your blog will reap the biggest rewards when it comes to organic reach. But, like the saying goes… quality over quantity. It’s far more beneficial to post four quality blog posts a month, than 16 quick posts that no one will be interested in.
Having your blog packed with exceptional articles will increase your searchable content. After you’re done researching and brainstorming content ideas, it’s important to organize them into key topics your content should be centred around. Let’s call these content bundles.
Each bundle contains a group of different blog posts that revolve around the same key topic. Each post has different, but related targeted keywords.
For example, you might have a content bundle around “CPC bidding strategies.” Some topics in this bundle could include “the value of bidding on brand terms,” “advanced bidding tactics to maximize profits,” and “utilizing bid adjustments to decrease your cost-per-acquisition.” See the illustration below as a practical example for a Plumbing/HVAC company:
To create high-quality blog articles, generate a content plan for the next 2-3 months. A great content plan includes what topics you want to cover, what type of content to create, who is writing the article and a publish date. While you’re here, map out your content bundles and what topics and keywords should be inside each bundle. For that plumbing company example, one content bundle might include a blog post about the HVAC software they use as a CRM and for job management.
Once the articles are written, always interlink to related articles on your website. This will show search engines that your company’s blog focuses on certain topics, showcasing that the website is a reliable source for information.
The sooner you understand how to properly select and use target keywords, the sooner your content will rise in search engines.
Ahrefs, a data-driven marketing toolset, conducted a study in February 2017 about one question we’ve all asked … “How long does it take to rank in Google?”. You know you’ve been there and questioned why your company hasn’t popped up on the first page of the Google search.
The case study took two million random keywords and the average ranking page was more than two-years-old. Those sites that ranked at the number one position were on average three-years-old. Only 22% of pages that currently rank in the top ten are within one-year-old.
In other words, it can take awhile to reach Google’s first page and big results aren’t expected for 9-12 months.
By creating evergreen content you will stay relevant throughout the entire buyer’s journey.
Remember, it’s called the Buyer’s Journey not the Buyer’s Quick Sale for a reason.
Within those evergreen posts, you should be using long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords are three or four words that are specific to what you’re writing about. Using more specific wording will help prospects find your content, and will have an easier time ranking since there is far less competition.
Now that you know how to improve your blog, it’s time to focus on sharing this meaningful content with the world.
Not every platform will benefit you and that’s okay. When you find the ones that don’t bring in traffic, don’t spend time on them.
HubSpot says that 54% of people open emails on mobile devices, so emails must be phone-friendly.
Keeping subscribers happy means creating valuable content and producing new offers.
In the guest post, you should have your biography with a link back to your website or blog. This allows you to gain external links from relevant and authoritative websites. This is important for the search engines to pick up on, and for the readers who enjoyed your article and want to learn more about you.
For your inbound strategy to succeed, you need to be able to track what is working and what’s not. Analyzing helps close the loop on your day-to-day marketing efforts. There are six areas to focus on when tracking and measuring your company’s content. Each area is different and has different goals and metrics to follow.
Brand awareness measures reach on different social media channels, business mentions and how many people are searching for your company.
Engagement measures who’s viewing your content and interacting with it. By measuring who is seeing your content, you see the signals readers are giving you without you having to ask them questions. Are they sharing your content? What about liking, retweeting or sharing it?
Lead generation allows you to prove your time and money have been well spent. You can measure how many leads have been generated and compare against your marketing / content producing costs.
Customer conversation and sales allow you to measure your Return on Investment (ROI). This will show where your strategy is falling short and will help provide a new way to move forward.
Customer loyalty and retention show you the life value of your customers. It measures how often they buy from you and if they’re coming back for more. If you can get your customers to stick with you, your ROI grows exponentially.
Web analytics will help you understand how visitors are finding your content, how engaged they are and allows you to measure your organic growth over time. You can also view which landing pages and blog posts are performing best, and make data driven decisions to improve your visitor experience and site conversion rate.
When you find areas that need improvements, don’t change everything at once. Make small changes one at a time, that way you can track if they were the right changes. If you change everything at once, there will be no way of telling what the difference maker (good or bad) was.
In conclusion, increased organic reach will take time. Like we said before, it’s called a journey for a reason. Quality, educational-based content posted at a high frequency is your key to growth.
We can't promise you overnight results, but we can promise steady improvements. These eight tips will help you create a more sustainable future with better online exposure, increased organic traffic, a steady flow of new subscribers and more quality leads.