Think blogs are the tired, old format of yesteryear content that no one looks at anymore?
Collecting dust on the online shelf of websites around the world, faded pages with decrepit old text just barely legible…
Well, I urge you to reach inside your head and rejig your brain to think again, cos that is not the case, my friend.
In fact, blogs are being heralded as the saviour in the fast-moving race to beat the bots in the world of long form content these days.
Back in the (g)olden days of internet (before the AI warlords took over every corner of the world wide web) when eBay felt like a huge garage sale full of dodgy half-working equipment, and MySpace created real life dramas by making you choose your Top 8… blogs were written by real life human beings, instead of bots with their tiny robot fingers working faster than you could possibly imagine.
And those blogs formed the basis of what is now known as long form content, and still one of the most widely used forms today.
Sure, people think that blogs are outdated and no one reads them anymore.
But I want to get some stats into your brain so you can see just how this medium can work for you…
- About 70% of consumers prefer blogs over ads to learn about companies, and feel more connected to the brand after engaging with the content
- Active blogs can boost websites with 434% more indexed pages, meaning that there are more pages on your website for search engines to crawl (hello, SEO!)
- 77% of internet users report that they regular read blog posts, confirming that reading blogs remains an important source of info
- Companies with blogs generate 67% more leads each month compared to those without blogs
Source: https://www.hostinger.com/au/tutorials/blogging-statistics/
How about them apples, hey?!
It’s absolutely no secret that blogging is hella good for your business. It just kinda got pushed to the side when social media platforms (aka the Cool Kidz) decided to show up to the party.
Blogs may have been forgotten about for a while but all this time they’ve just sat there quietly, still pulling in visitors to websites, without making a fuss.
Having current blogs on your site can help you boost not only your credibility but also your appearance in search engines, PLUS it can place you as a thought leader in your field by having a library of written content for your consumers to learn from.
But what would I blog about, you ask?
To that I say… think about what you currently post on social media.
That exact same content can be repurposed into long form content to create a steady stream of blogs that can help you be seen without fighting the social media algorithm.
A blog on your website is a must have if you want to have more chance of Google finding you and recommending you to searchers.
It’s easy to maintain and keep updated, and the content lives on for as long as you want it to (however don’t forget we still need to prune the blog library and keep it fresh… Google likes that freshhh content!) – and if you treat it with the right SEO and structure then it could very well be your number one performing page on your site.
So the next time you’re creating a Reel and making moves on your socials, don’t forget to think a bit further ahead and turn that content into a long form piece too. Adding posts to your website bit by bit will help you build a steady stream of content to help drive visitors to your site.
Now, before you go, I want to draw you to an example of a VERY old blog post of mine, from 10 years ago (holy heck, that’s a long time!) of an interview I did with someone.
Context for you… this is an old personal blog of mine which I haven’t touched in years. I mean… legit the last post I made was in 2021! I’ve never done anything to the site in terms of advertising, SEO, keywords – heck, I didn’t even know anything about structing a site or a blog post back then!
Side note: I’m using this as an example to show you what happens when you create long form content on your site, and how it can be found in search engines. This piece is very outdated and the website should be cleaned up and old posts should be archived at some point, but look… it’s on my to do list, alright?!
But this post here has been sitting quietly online, not doing much except for pulling in viewers when someone searches for the interviewees name.
No one is actively Googling my old blog name – they are searching for the person I interviewed – and this blog post STILL appears in search results.
In fact, the stats for this one blog post over 10 years?
A total of 6.8K views even though I have not touched it, helped, boosted or ANYTHING during that time.
Now, that’s not be super impressive considering that’s over a 10 year period.
But imagine if I had also put all of these things in place, and let it all work together in the background:
- Website and page structure setup correctly
- Blog post formatted correctly for SEO
- Promoted the content through my marketing channels
- Updated the content when required to keep it fresh and relevant
I certainly would have more views, visits to my website and people would know about me and what I do.
AND that in turn makes people more than likely to buy from me as I am a reputable source of information and they know me from my regular content.
To sum it all up, blogs are here to stay and they play a huge role in helping your business be seen online.
If you have a blog already, now is the time to update it! And if you don’t have one, then there’s no time like the present to get started.
