The Copywriter Source

If you have a website, then you should have a blog. Not only are blogs one of the most important ways to build SEO, but they are also a way to build your company’s identity, relate to the industry, build an audience, and establish a teaching regimen for your expertise. It is a way to give back and transfer information that is beneficial, and is also a way to maintain awareness that your business is still in operation.

In this article, we’re going to talk about the state of blogging, debunking click-bait beliefs that “blogs are done”, and what you can do to make sure that your small business or startup blogs the right way.

A Quick Look at the State of Blogging

Blogging began like a freight train of content possibilities somewhere around 2004. We know that blogging wasn’t invented in 2004, but that’s when the concept began to take shape. The industry had come up with a name for this idea of creating a log of articles, and then revealing how it can be beneficial for virtually any business, industry, including nonprofit organizations. What began as a style of “journaling” for tech people transferred into other industries.

Blogging was also very popular during the 2010s, especially from people who had established themselves just a few years before. This decade saw a steady growth in blogs for self-help and other niches. The early adopters of blogging saw their work pay off into the 2010s, where eventually, streaming audio programs became very popular. Contrary to popular belief, streaming audio shows are about the same age as blogging … more about that shortly.

The Evolution of Searches About Blogging

Here is a crazy graph where you can see a correlation with how the search for “blogging” actually peaked way before the 2010s. This graph doesn’t tell us the evolution of the value of having a blog, but that in the early days, people were asking about blogs in the search engines, probably to see what a blog was about.

This was the time to start a blog because back then you didn’t have as many limitations on marketing your blog, due to the fact that this was also the primal age of social media in the form of social bookmarking, which meant that you could catch more fish. These days, there are very few social bookmarking sites because they have all sold out.

If you had a blog back in the early days, you knew how easy it was to get traffic over night.

Even though the golden age of blogging is past, blogs are here to stay when it comes to inbound marketing. It is even considered one of the main platforms for writing and journalism today. In fact, for this very reason, blogs are still a disruptive innovation to older forms of journalistic platforms.

It’s not that blogs are irrelevant, it is just that they aren’t really the “new thing” anymore. Rather, they have become a standard. And, you may be wondering whether video and streaming media are threats to blogging. We will take a look at that, in the next heading.

Blogs Are Still Relevant, and Streaming Audio Isn’t “New”

Lately, you hear a lot of people negating the value of having a blog, and especially from people who blog.

They claim that blogs were “replaced” by streaming media, especially audio streams like you would see on Spotify. They claim that streaming audio shows and YouTube videos are newer than blogs and that’s why they are “more popular”). However, this is a bit confabulated. Streaming media, and the popularity of video is not older than blogging. Rather, they have developed within the same time frame. Video sharing on the internet predates YouTube, who perfected the business model, and streaming media is about as old as blogging itself.

To claim that “people want streaming audio instead of blogs” reveals a lack of realizing the big picture.

More people make audio-streaming content because for some, it’s easier to do. With audio programs, they do not have to abide by as many grammatical rules, and if they are limited by lack of an ability to type, or maybe they are better talkers than writers. Audio streams are basically radio shows that are transmitted through the internet.

Audio Content is Not New

Audio-streaming programs are just as old as blogs. In fact, Chris Lydon’s Open Source (2003) was considered the first audio-streaming program, even though we know it wasn’t. It was simply the first popular one.

There were streaming radio-style shows transmitted through the internet way before 2003. Lydon referred to the program as an “audioblog”, which means that the idea of a blog was very much coexistent with audio streaming programs. It was around that type that journal-style web logs were renamed to “blogs” and the blog mania began. This could be why some have inaccurately documented that blogs are older than audio streams. Besides that, audio streams are really just radio shows that are streaming through the internet instead of radio. Today’s live audio streams are basically radio shows. Slightly before the internet became poularized, radio shows were slowly becoming old hat media, mostly reserved for quick weather reports and political commentary. The internet has proven that this format is still very popular with the success of programs like Joe Rogan, and now there are audio shows for all kinds of topics.

I have an article elsewhere on the internet about the history of blogs. I’m not writing too much about it here because it’ll get way out of scope. Basically, when blogs started out, they were very informal, lacking H1/H2 headlines, and things like grammar were not important. That approach was handed over to microblogging. At some point, blogs became sort of like a newsletter that you visit instead of being sent to you. Then the rules came, and then came the formulaic boredom driven by standards that are now called “blog style”.

Here are some better reasons for why blogs have declined …

• The reason why people don’t start blogs much is because most people do not like to write, and would rather talk.
• The second reason is that that many people don’t like to read, which isn’t anything new. People didn’t like to read when blogs were all of the rage.
• The third reason is that marketing a new blog is very difficult today. In 2010, you had social bookmark sites such as Technorati, Delicious, and tons more.
• Newsletters … which, are technically blog posts sent through email.
• People search for blogs less because we are no longer in the Information-Super-Highway era of the internet, but the Facebook era. Most people are anchored to the internet on mobile phones, through Facebook, which means they are too busy with scrolling to search.

That said, people do still like to look for new blogs, and even read them. Some people like to read because reading has a different effect on the brain than listening. The brain interprets the information differently. It’s presented differently, and its capability and dynamic is unique. That said, listening also has a unique effect, and so a lot of people who listen to audio streams also like to read magazines and blogs.

Before you start a blog, make sure you have the following things.

These 3 things will make it easier to launch your blog with an audience.

1. You have an established audience from somewhere else
2. Have an established audience from something you do
3. Have an established audience

We want to emphasize that having an audience before you begin your blog makes it easier to grow an audience, even if your audience is relatively small. The same is true for newsletters and any other social media marketing channel.

This is not to say that you can’t start a blog audience from scratch. I’ve done it in the past, but it was way easier when the internet was more open. It’s not as easy today.

Fear not, because there are some secrets to establishing a successful blog, today.

Do you want to know what it is?

I’m about to tell you.

Are you in suspense now?

Do I have your attention?

Good.

Because here’s what you need to do first …

Take your blog seriously

Just like with startups, one of the reasons why blogs don’t take off is because the people running it do not take it seriously.

So, if you’re going to start a blog, know that it’s going to take a while to build an audience from scratch. If you quit or get out of scope with maintaining it, the blog will eventually be neglected and show artifacts that reflect this.

An observation of small-business websites reveal that many of these businesses allow their website to sit dormant while the business continues to run its operations. To users of the website, this makes it appear that the business may no longer be in operation.

Such artifacts are:

• The latest blog posts is 6 months or more older

• The website itself has a seasonal motif that is out of season, such as a CTA for winter sale that is still on the website during the summer.

• The latest content contains references to outdated events, such as the pandemic.
  
• This isn’t 2010, and the open agora of the internet of old is no longer, but if you can show that the blog IS the product, then you will do well. So, if you’re on Facebook, take advantage of that because that’s where most people are going to find out about your blog or business website.

Mistakes like these are quick “slices” of information that may instantly get the user to click off of the website.

1. Groom Your Blog

Make your blog and website look like they are taken seriously by continuously updating it, and even updating older posts with more relevant information. The blog should be interacting with your business and other sections of your website. That means, blog posts should contain links to other pages of your website, such as products, e-stores, newsletter subscription, contact forms, and even social media.

2. Keep the Blog’s Message Consistent

Your company’s mission and core values should be reflected on each and every blog post that you write. That is, a blog post should not contain any different values that is not reflected along the company’s multi-platform marketing strategy.

For instance, if your slogan is “the customer is always right”, then don’t write a blog post about how the customer is always wrong.

Don’t contain anything contradictory to the company’s core values on any marketing channel. For instance, if an e-book is free on your website, then you shouldn’t have people pay for the e-book on an online bookstore. Also, don’t use a different company logo on social media ads from the logo that is on your website.

3. Establishing Credibility

I think I’ve made it clear that it used to be EASY to get a blog audience.

It isn’t now.

People are pickier, more skeptical, and less likely to think for themselves than ever before.

Society has built this archetype called “some guy”, or the “any person”.

They’ll say things like “anybody can start a blog”. Well, so what? Anybody also includes those who are qualified. I’m not saying that anybody should start a blog about how to do surgery, but why would someone who is not a surgeon feel motivated to start a surgery blog? They generally wouldn’t. People are generally drawn toward things that they are good at, or know something about. Start a blog about your hobby. You don’t need a degree to have a hobby. Is someone whose hobby isn’t your hobby going to start a blog about your hobby? Help other people who have the same hobby achieve more satisfaction out of it. Better results.

They want to read things from people they trust. And, gaining that trust often requires a perfect set of circumstances that very few people have the chance to acquire due to income and lack of opportunity. They want to hear things from someone who went to MIT, or a former Silicon Valley CEO who couldn’t quite make the team. Someone who has a “proven track record”. The problem is that a proven track record doesn’t mean much unless the track record applies. Often, these people are sick of working in those fields and they go and start a protein powder company, and use their tech background as social proof that they can sell protein powder. For some reason, it works.

Thomas Edison would have had a difficult time marketing himself today, since he was self-taught and didn’t have a degree in anything. Ironically, most education programs teach some of the things that he discovered. Think about that. Thomas Edison’s blog would be full of comments calling him an autodidact and questioning his authority to study things in a lab. Rational Wiki would have articles calling him a pseudoscientific quack. That’s how the world works today.

5. Give the Customer Advice

Creating blog posts that give customers news or advice that is related to your industry is one of the easiest ways to keep your blog updated, and to have others take it seriously. Make sure that the advice is given in an engaging way that shows that you know what you’re talking about.

For instance, if you have a plumbing website, you can offer website users free advice about things such as how to unclog a kitchen drain using a plunger, or the best enzymes to use, or how enzymes can be dangerous.

If you have a gardening business and sell gardening products, your blog is an opportunity to deliver quality content to your customer, such as germinating seeds, or how to deal with garden pests without using chemicals. People like hands-on training, so these would be good topics that can lead into signing people up for an in-person class, or online webinar.

Quality Writing is Overrated

You may have read someone say that the reason that you don’t get reads on your articles is that you need to make more “quality writing”.

That’s like saying that someone can’t quack like a duck. What is quacking like a duck? It depends on who you ask, and what you believe a duck sounds like.

Their idea of quality writing is a formula, like having consistent headings, bullet points, short paragraphs, and doing all of these checkpoints to ensure quality writing. These things are all important, but there is no such thing as a standard that can make people read. Marketing agencies like McKinsey do nothing but study how people read, and you can do everything they tell you and still not engage people because it’s not about the format, but what you say.

So, it’s not whether your article is 800 words or more, it is whether your article is 800 words or more of saying useful things. If you depend too much on metrics for “quality writing” instead of quality content, then you may risk boring people by presenting a style and not a message. This is also what makes a lot of companies unsuccessful in copywriting messages, because they choose to use jargon and important-sounding words to bore the reader instead of inform them in an engaging way.

Some people will tell you that there is “too much to read” on the Internet. There has always been too much to read on the Internet. Saying that there is too much to read on the internet is like saying there is too much water in the ocean. The ocean is there to hold water, so why criticize the ocean for doing what it was meant to do? Yet, with all of the information that is on the internet, most of what gets read are trivial things, like Buzzfeed articles. It shouldn’t be too hard to stand out by putting in a little effort.

The days of throwing empty words on a page and calling it a blog, while waiting for affiliate marketing to pay you for clicks on random, bland content are no longer relevant. You have to stand out by producing quality content that gets to the heart of the matter, while at the same time, optimizing your writing with headings and bullet points, and paragraph lengths that are considerate for the reader.

Your Blog Helps SEO, But It’s Not For SEO

You want to know whether you should start a blog for your business. Hopefully, we have helped you realize that it is great for your business and for SEO. However, that shouldn’t be the reason why you start a blog. You should start a blog to have the blog be a source of important information, because it’s natural that if your content is perfunctory, then so will your ability to get conversions. Blogging rewards those who take the effort to understand every detail that it comes to optimizing your content, and does not reward those who neglect it. There are a lot of company blogs who do not update their blogs on a regular basis, and then there are also a lot of blogs that publish too much content, not allowing for evergreen content.

If you create quality bite-sized content that solves problems and also establishes a path to feature articles that solve multiple problems, then this is the best way to construct your blog’s content. This is called clustering. It’s creating a blog that functions like a machine, and not like a mere collection of articles about random topics. All of your articles should tie together in some way. This is good for SEO, but without taking care of always updating your blog with relevant content that ties together little points that establish a big picture, then you can win, and get quality conversions to your business.

Your Blog is a Test Kitchen, Not a Laboratory

Nobody goes to a blog to get a scholarly education, but as a supplement to learning. Your highest-quality content should always be in the form of the product, service, books, case studies, white papers, and even webinars. Your blog is naturally going to be a pathway to your most valuable products. Some younger “marketing bros” believe that they can write a long-form web page that excites people and leads people to purchase a webinar about nothing and make a lot of money. But that is a lousy way to run a business. Your highest-value content should be just that … high value.

So, this idea that every blog article needs to have a lot of words, or be as well-researched as a UC Berkley study, using technical writing and of the such, then you don’t understand why people read blogs. If you want to publish innovative research, write a white paper or a case study. That said … this doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t research from good sources in your blog post, but that’s another article. Treat your blog like a test kitchen, just don’t treat it like a bag of potato chips.

Many people who are looking for blog writers for hire believe that their articles need to read like they were written by a Rhodes scholar, and they want a specific number of words per article, believing that people will be more likely to value the article for its many words. Again, they don’t understand why people read blogs. A valuable blog post can be as little as a few paragraphs, or much more. What is more important is to ask yourself if the content of the article fulfills the promise of the headline.

Key Points: What Not to Do

It is highly recommended that you start a blog with your business, along with some other marketing channels. It is worth the effort, but you should know that it is not 2010 anymore, and while social bookmarking has become an extinct form of blog promotion, promoting a blog is still highly dependent on factors such as producing high-quality content, and search engine optimization. Rather, your blog should be an addition to your website, and not the website itself.

Now, we should discuss what not to do if you are considering blogging.

If you want to be unsuccessful with a blog, then do these things …

• Don’t update very much because “it’s just a blog” or “I’m too busy”
• Don’t convert audiences from other channels.
• Write bland and perfunctory articles because all that is important is SEO.
• Treat blogging like it’s a hobby.
• Rely on boring “blog-post style” instead of adventurous, visually-communicative content.
• Be uninterested in what you write about.
• Use boring, generic headlines in your posts/articles.
• Make your posts entirely of bullet lists and headings.
• Don’t use visuals or videos within the article.
• Make blog posts full of data with little insights.
• Make blog posts full of insights without data, or full of data without insights.

These are basically the same rules for any of your other marketing channels, whether they would be newsletter marketing or YouTube videos. Engaging content that informs or entertains always wins over being boring.