I am going to start of this post by saying, emphatically, that Savvy B2B Marketing is NOT a keyword blog. Savvy B2B is a real blog, with a lot of heart and soul in it, written for the purpose of sharing and discussing ideas about B2B marketing. But there does exist a different kind of blog, one that has sprung up in recent years once the idea got around that search engines LOVE blogs. And they do.
Blogs offer fresh, changing content, links into and out of your website, and, if you are writing about something that is relevant to your website, you will naturally use a lot of keywords that are also relevant to your potential audience. After writing regularly in your blog for awhile, you will have so many keywords on your site that you can’t help but rise to the top of the Google ranks. This post is about how to write one of those blogs.
In recent years this has become very easy. WordPress has become ubiquitous, but there are many different platforms to choose from. You can associate your blog with your website, or you can migrate your entire website to a blog platform. This has the added advantage of working as a web-based content management system for your website, so you can change other pages quickly and easily as well. Keep in mind that if you keep the blog separate from your website, it will be your blog that appears at the top of the search rankings, not your website, so make sure that everything in the blog points back to your website. Talking to your web hosting provider will give you a good idea of your options, as will a Google search of the topic. My advice would be to not obsess over the platform, but pick one and jump in.
How often should you post? Of course, the more posts you have, the better, but you want to be realistic and not burn yourself out. Set a realistic schedule and then stick to it. I blog for a client who has me write one post a day for each of four blogs, all of which point back to his main website. He has about 1000 posts on each of the blogs, and his blogs come up first for just about every Google search you could do on his various areas of specialty. But he has a very high level of commitment to his blogs that keeps him motivated to write 1-3 articles himself every day in addition to the ones he pays me to write. Pick a level of commitment you are comfortable with and then put it on your calendar.
This is very important. Do not for one second think that you can just jam a bunch of keywords into a crappy article and call it a day. No, these do not have to be carefully crafted pieces, but people will actually be reading them when they find them on a Google search, and you want them to be impressed enough to continue on to your main website. Some great topics for blogging include:
- Answer a question that customers or prospects frequently ask you
- Comment on a news article that touches on your industry
- Write about an aspect of your business that is not common knowledge
- Let readers know about upcoming events you may be attending
- Expand on a tiny benefit of your product or service that may be frequently overlooked
- Talk about trends in your industry
Someone once said that if you are going to write a blog about coffee, you need to pick one type of bean to blog about. Pick one very narrow topic and write about 200-500 words on it. If you can, include a link to more information somewhere in the article. And don’t forget to include a call to action along with a link to your website or contact page.
There is plenty more to know about blogging for keywords, but this should get you a nice start.
Do you have any tips or success stories about blogging for keyword lift? Share them in the comments section!
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