Small businesses come in many different forms, but for those that focus on physical products over services, building a blog can be challenging. After all, how many ways can you talk about office supplies, bedding, or lamps? Over time, it can start to seem repetitive.
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Facing this uphill battle, small businesses need to get creative to keep their blogs interesting and increase engagement with their products. If you’re seeking to expand your blog and highlight your company’s products in an exciting way, then, you need to broaden your content base. These five approaches can help you provide end users with added value, boost engagement, and – most importantly – turn traffic into sales.
Approaches To The Profile
Profiling your products is an easy way to highlight their features and build a lot of content, but from a practical perspective, this approach puts your sales strategy ahead of your clients’ needs, and that’s a big no-no. Whenever you’re developing blog posts, it’s vital that the content puts the customer first. If you want to write profiles, then you need to find ways to shift the focus, while still integrating key items.
One way you might approach the profile form other than through a particular product is by interviewing customers and staff members at your business. These profiles give you the opportunity to show that loyalty goes both ways; publicly thank top customers for their patronage, and let someone else be the booster for your products.
Examples of this include:
- Mail a Personal, Handwritten Letter
- Give a Thoughtful Gift (No Strings Attached!)
- Cover a Bill
- Highlight Special Customers
- Go Above and Beyond
As for your staff, blog profiles are a great way for you to give customers a peek behind the scenes at your entire business, as opposed to focusing only on an individual. Yes, this person’s perspective will personalize the post – and allow you to repeat the blog style more than once, but you’ll also be able to choose questions that fold your products seamlessly into the interview.
Set The Scene
While your small business blog should avoid highlighting products one-by-one, a great way to keep these items in the spotlight is by positioning them within a larger scene. If you already have a blog in place and are creating content, this is a perfect way to seamlessly integrate your products within actual value posts.
For example, these battery operated candles could be presented within the context of an entire table setting, with plates, linens, and centerpieces. Or, they could be discussed in a blog post about changes you could make to childproof your home. The approach can work for any product niche and also translates well to social media posts, including visual-first formats like Instagram.
Just take a look at the main page of their site and see the many different types of candles that are out on the market today. Scroll down and you will start to understand how an ecommerce based company can use blogging to their advantage, while also growing their business and serving value.
As we all know, pretty much everyone is heading to Google to find answers to all of their questions. The same holds true for everything relating to candles as well. If we head over to this site’s blog, we can see a bunch of detailed posts on the following topics:
- Choosing The Right Luminara Candle
- Selecting the Ideal LED Candles
- Mini LED Lights Indoor and Outdoor
- Window Candle Safety
The takeaway here is, if you can provide value to your audience and problem them with a solution to their question or dilemma (while also sending them to your site), then you can definitely start increasing your site traffic, sales, and branding in the process.
Time-Bound Posts
Not all blog posts need to be evergreen or even seasonal content. Instead, it can be beneficial to also develop some time-bound content. Indeed, you should never let a sale or special offer go unmentioned. Rather, posting about limited-time offers can create a sense of urgency and boost sales, whether you’re hyping your Cyber Monday deals or a sale that’s unique to you. And don’t forget: if you offer special sales to store members or other VIPs, make sure to talk about these. Your VIP deals shouldn’t be a secret because promoting them can be just what potential members need to transition to a higher engagement level.
Recap And Relate
Have you ever attended an industry event and thought, ‘Gee, I bet my customers would be interested in this’? Then why not highlight events you attend on your blog? Industry events can seem like a secret world to your customers and sharing about them is intriguing for them, as well as other professionals in associated fields. Additionally, industry event recaps lend themselves to a lot of content. You can profile speakers, talk about how you pitch your products, discuss networking strategies, and even post about industry trends. Depending on how long the event is and what topics you wish to explore, you could stretch these topics over several posts.
Here are ten of the 40 blog post ideas recommended by TheBalanceSMB to help you get started:
Don’t Forget High-Value Forms
High-value blog posts are the best way to build backlinks, yet many bloggers don’t make sufficient use of them. As you expand your blog, then, be sure to provide link roundups, cover frequently asked questions, and relevant downloadable resources. These posts are more engaging than straight product profiles, and are actually more likely to build your site’s domain authority.
Video is also gaining in popularity as a high-value format, less because it yields a lot of backlinks and more because it facilitates a high level of engagement. Users spend more time on pages that feature video, and as a business owner, you can parlay your video content into multiple other posts and use it across a variety of platforms. Video storytelling is also a great way to create a personal connection between your business and your customers.
Your company’s blog is one of the most powerful tools at your disposal and, if used correctly, it can fuel substantial growth. That’s why it’s important that you don’t limit yourself to a few formats. To broaden your base, you need to expand your blog’s horizons.
How will you think about your products in a wider context?
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