This is something I’m clearly passionate about. And if you’re a business owner, you should be, too! Though the reasons to have a blog are endless, here are some of the main ones:

1. Connect with your audience
   • A blog post can be extremely conversational, personal, fun, and short. If the thought of writing 3-4 blog posts per month overwhelms you, stop right there. Connecting with your audience can be as simple as sharing a short story, a list, 1 paragraph with a few photos, an industry update, or a brief showcase of one of your products or services. You would be surprised at how easy it is to crank out a blog post when you have a good idea.
2. Position yourself as a thought-leader in your industry
   • Don’t you want to be known as the go-to person for advice in your niche?! Show your audience that you know what you’re talkin’ about. If you don’t, they may never find out!
3. Improve your SEO and Google ranking
   • Google favors websites who are consistently updating their site. So, the more you blog, the higher you’ll be ranked when someone searches for key words you’re using.
4. Grow your email list
   • This is huge (and something I personally need to improve on). With the ongoing changes in social media for brands, it’s important to have another way to contact your past, current, and future clients. Social media is essentially “rented space”, so, make sure you don’t lose your audience if you lost your social media profiles tomorrow.
5. Provide free, valuable content to your audience
   • This will help you build trust and credibility. If you’re worried about giving away too much information for free, don’t be. This has proven to be successful time and time again for bringing potential clients into a sales funnel.
6. Drive more traffic to your website
   • Do you consistently go to a business’ website if they don’t have a blog or another way they consistently update their site? Probably not. This is a no-brainer! Use social as a tool to drive traffic to your blog/website, and hopefully viewers will be led to other pages on your site, and either opt-in or use your contact form.

There you have it! Would you be interested in more content about blogging? How to come up with a blog strategy? The best hosting sites? Tips on crafting the perfect blog?