You have probably heard lots of stories about businesses running a blog. You’ve probably read lots of business blogs too – you are reading one right now! What about your business, though? Should you start a business blog? Let’s look at the advantages and disadvantages.

Disadvantages of Starting a Blog

Let’s start with the disadvantages. Firstly, you will need the facility to create a blog. You may already have this on your website or have the skills in-house to add it. If not, you will need to get the help of a website developer, although the investment you’ll need to make will be relatively small.

Once you have the technical capability, you then need the time to create good quality blog articles or the money to pay someone to write them for you. Bad quality articles will damage the reputation of your brand. An inconsistent publishing schedule won’t help either.

Benefits of Starting a Blog

  • Build trust, enhance your reputation, and demonstrates your expertise – potential customers want to know that you know what you are talking about before buying your products or services. A blog helps you achieve this. It will also build your personal reputation in the industry which will make you more visible and can generate new leads.
  • Get more traffic to your website – blogs bring traffic to your website from Google, particularly for long-tail keywords. You will also get traffic from social media and other websites whenever people share your blog.
  • Delivers long-term results – you can get traffic to your website via your blog over the long term if you write evergreen articles. In other words, the small investment you make in creating a great piece of content could bring you, potential customers, for many years to come.
  • Boost your presence on social media – social media works best when you have valuable content to share. You can create this content on your blog.
  • Generate leads – a blog is a lead generation tool as it brings traffic to your website.
  • Learn more about your customers – the statistics you get from your blog will tell you a lot about your customers. For example, what topics are the most likely to read, and what articles generate the most interaction?
  • Get feedback from customers – you can also use your blog to get feedback from customers. For example, you can introduce a new product or service and ask customers what they think about it. This helps with business strategy, teaches you more about your customers, and helps build closer links to those customers.
  • Adds personality to your brand – most good blogs are informal and conversational. As a result, they are the perfect opportunity to inject some personality into your brand, make your business friendlier, and show your customers what really makes you tick.
  • Starting a Business Blog – The benefits of starting a blog in your business far outweigh the disadvantages. You will have to devote time and/or money to make it work properly for you, however. In this regard, blogging is no different from any other marketing strategy. That said, the investment in time and/or money is minimal.