Regular blogging for small businesses in 2021

For the longest time, the difference between small scale business and large scale business has been like night and day. Be it the size of capital, number of employees or mass vs niche market, the list looks endless except for one emerging exception!

Following the Global pandemic that has tested businesses to the limit regardless of their size, Online Space will remain the common battleground for brands (big and small) and only those who know how to play their cards right will recover from the harsh effects of 2020.

For as long as the threat of Covid-19 exists, your target clients will prefer to transact online rather than over the counter. It’s therefore imperative that small businesses adopt various strategies to generate new leads online and sustain their brand loyalty among existing clientele.

Regular blogging is one of the tried and tested strategies that small businesses ought to adopt quickly to keep their existing customers engaged while acquiring new ones.

There are many benefits of blogging for business but today I shall highlight the top three.

Growth of loyal clientele

Regular blogs that respond to particular business pain points increase readership over time and capture the attention of those who feel that your posts respond to their business needs. The regular readers of your blogs posts then develop interest in the business solutions you offer and thereafter move from just being mere audiences of your posts to converts.

When need arises they don’t look further but seek your solutions because a connection has already been established. A good pre buying delight, therefore, transitions a convert to a loyal client and soon after, an advocate for your products and services.

To simplify it, regular blogging accelerates the customer lifecycle through the four stages of Awareness, Acquisition, Conversion, Retention and Advocacy. A successful business is one whose clients are not just walk-in-walk-out types, but ambassadors who participate in the growth of the business by spreading the good word (sharing links).

Increase of Web traffic through SEO

The global pandemic that is Covid-19 has brought about a new paradigm shift in the way business is done. This is evidenced by various global giants that are leading The-Work-From-Home Revolution including Facebook, Twitter and Square. The shift from brick & mortar to online platforms is quickly gaining permanence and a lot of dollars are being invested to support this move.

What this means is that many business enterprises are quickly disregarding the old marketing collaterals that include posters, fliers and embracing digital marketing strategies that would not only increase web traffic but also generate leads and conversions.

While your walk in clients have in the past relied on your physical marketing collaterals to find their way to your local store, your present and future client will rely on your digital marketing collaterals to get to your virtual door step.

If your most loyal clients cannot find you in digital spaces, they are likely to find alternatives from your competitors. This is where search engine optimization (SEO) comes in. Your digital content ought to be readily available and visible online (optimized) for your existing clients and potential clients to see and make a buy decision.

Email Collection

Small business owners may not have the luxury of huge spending on paid ads, electronic media ads and other expensive forms of marketing. However, they can ask visitors of their websites to subscribe to their regular blogs and then add the subscribers’ emails to their marketing funnels.

They can thereafter generate leads and conversions through promotional emails.

Micro moments

Since the opportunity for feel and touch most products has been lost thanks to Covid-19 restrictions, customers seeking to buy online need to be informed, persuaded and convinced. With the availability of mobile phones, it has now become easier to access information from these gadgets while on the go.

In fact according to Pew Research, 5 billion people around the world from developing countries to the developed now own a mobile device. This include smartphones and other handheld devices like tablets that are constantly connected to the World Wide Web.

Recent research indicate that buying decisions and preferences are shaped as people check their mobile devices about 150 times a day. It further indicates that each of these times, people use their phones for an average of 1 minute and 10 seconds.

Studies have further shown that during this short period of time, people check email, respond to texts, scroll newsfeeds and go to Google to search for information they need. This is what Google calls a ‘micro moment’ and therein lies the opportunity for your informative blog to be seen!

Micro moments are revolutionizing the business landscape and your business ought to seize the opportunity by constantly creating Search Engine Optimized (SEO) blogs that gets the attention of the target clients.

Conclusion

If you are interested in increasing your online visibility while establishing yourself as the preferred provider of products and services in your industry, then you may want to take up blogging as one of your winning market strategies.

For small businesses, blogging is essentially a basic marketing necessity. In case you don’t have the time, resources or expertise to develop blog content, you can outsource the service from an agency like Sky Eagle who can write unique, relevant and valuable articles for your blog site.