Some say Blogging is Dead!

Can you name one successful online company that doesn’t have a blog today?

Yet as shocking as it may be, there are still lots of people who haven’t made it a priority in their business. And they are missing out BIG TIME.

If you’re serious about creating a REAL online business, putting your time, effort and energy into a blog without a doubt one of the most important things you can do to drive your business forward.

You must be PRESENT!  Your website is your store front.

So….

10 SMART Reasons You Absolutely Must Start Blogging Today:

1. Powerful Branding

People trust brands they are familiar with. While big companies spend Millions and even Billions of Dollars to build their brand, the little guy can use blogging to build up their brand.

As a blogger, the more valuable content you create the more visibility you get. As well as position yourself as a thought leader. Think about authors. When you see someone who has published a book, this automatically gives them credibility.

There’s simply no easier and faster way to brand yourself than with a blog. But you must know how to brand properly and effectively!

2. Create Engagement

Here’s some sales 101: People will NOT do business with someone they don’t like or trust. As a marketer, this needs to be your NUMBER ONE goal. Get them to like and trust you.

Creating dialogue and conversations instantly increases engagement. And engagement helps you connect and create that unshakable trust with your audience.

3. Get Search Traffic

Did you know that some huge brands rely solely on their blog to attract visitors?

Every post you publish, every video, article and piece of content is an opportunity to show up for terms your ideal prospect is searching for. Regular posting is like casting a wide net. The more content you have floating around the net, the more visitors you’ll attract.

Now, this doesn’t mean you should post for the search engines, you need to first and foremost write to people you want to attract, however keep those search terms in mind when creating titles.

4. Get Social Traffic

The Law of Reciprocation says that when you share value, people will do the same, by liking and sharing your content on social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and others… thereby getting you more traffic and comments.

Another side benefit is it boosts your search engine rankings. Because all this social activity makes your blog look like an authority website in the eyes of the search engines. And this is KEY to getting more organic traffic, or Google Luv as we call it.

Here’s a little tip: Next time you post (and really every time), you should also share with all your friends and followers to kick start this process.

5. Get Referral Traffic

When you buy something you like, go see a movie you enjoyed or have some kind of a positive experience don’t you feel like sharing it with others?

This natural human tendency can help you explode your referral traffic, because just like with social traffic, your readers will share your content with their friends or link to your blog from their blogs or websites if they get a lot of value out of it.

Which as with social traffic, also has the side benefit of boosting your rankings.

6. Grow Your Email List

The money is in the list. Ever heard that before?

It’s also the biggest reason to have a blog in the first place. Use it a lead generation tool that will turn visitors who like your content into subscribers and eventually raving fans.

Blogging the right way can help you put your list-building on steroids, and actually attract much better quality leads.

So many people miss out on all the opportunities to do this and they don’t know how to combine their blogging strategy with an effective list building strategy.

7. Discover Opportunity

As a marketer, you always want to be on the lookout for ways you can improve and serve your market better. Blogging allows you to gather valuable intelligence about your market’s problems and challenges.

This can lead to more opportunities to create additional revenue by finding or creating solutions for your people. Solutions that often you wouldn’t have discovered otherwise.

8. Sharpen Your Sword

This is perhaps one of the largest “non-tangible” benefits you’ll get from blogging. To create valuable content requires you to research, study and learn.

Additionally, you get to practice writing or creating videos, which only increases your skills as a marketer and entrepreneur. And builds your intellectual capital.

9. Cultivate Relationships

Another huge advantage to creating valuable content and participating in discussions with your prospects and customers is the relationships that come as a result.

It’s not just about getting people on your list. It’s about keeping them interested and wanting to hear and see more of what you have. There’s a big difference between a customer and an advocate. The way you build loyal following is with relationships.

As you continue to give and share, you create a bond with your subscribers and many of them will become your biggest advocates.

And that’s how you build your tribe!

10. Make More Sales

Isn’t this our number one goal as an entrepreneur or marketer? It’s kind of obvious, yet unless you have a blog you’re missing out on a huge chunk of your sales.

Here’s a startling statistic… Businesses that blog on a regular basis, estimate that about 60% of their sales come directly from their blogging efforts.

How about them apples?

So here’s the Million Dollar question…

WHY Isn’t Everyone Blogging?

After doing some digging and asking, here are the top 5 reasons people give for not blogging, and why they’re complete bullshit:

Don’t have the time – You don’t have the time to get more traffic, leads and sales? That’s crazy.

Don’t know what to write about – Later, I’ll show you how to get hundreds of ideas.

Don’t like writing – Then don’t! Who said blogging is all about writing? You can still be a blogger and get all the benefits by using video or even creating your own podcast.

Don’t know how to create a blog – In today’s day and age that’s a lame excuse. If you can point and click, you can create a blog in just minutes.

Don’t know anything about graphic design – Me either, but I created the graphic above and it was easy. We actually have a tutorial on our blog on how to use this free resource to create any kind of a graphic.

Look, here’s the bottom line. If you’re not blogging, your competitors who are blogging, are most likely snatching up your customers.

SHOCKING CONFESSION: Though I took a break from blogging because I too thought blogging was dead.  It’s time to change that, and I am going to be publishing valuable content a bit more often.

Until next time!