What Is a Blog Post?
A blog post is any article that is published on a website’s blog section. Blog posts typically cover a topic or query and can range from 600 to 2,000 words. They also contain other media types like images, videos, infographics, and interactive charts.
Business blog posts allow your business and you to share insights, thoughts, stories, and other information on any topic. They can increase brand awareness, credibility, and conversions. They can also help drive traffic to your site.
Continue reading to get tips on how to write blog posts that sell!
What Makes a Good Blog Post?
Before you start writing a blog, you should know the answers to questions such as “why would someone read this entire blog post?” “Why would this reader keep coming back for more?”.
Ultimately a blog post should be a conversation with one reader, like you are advising or counseling a friend. Of course, the hope is there are many others like this hypothetical friend who will lend on this blog post.
Hint: if you do your keyword and topic research, you shouldn’t ‘hope’ there will be readers. You should know there will be readers because that’s what your research tells you.
Beyond addressing a specific profile of a reader, a blog post should be informative and interesting. Blogs should answer readers’ questions and help them solve a problem they are having. Not just that; they need to be engaging as well.
It doesn’t suffice to just answer questions. You must also provide actionable steps in a way that isn’t boring for your readers. Your introduction should grab the attention of your readers and pull them in to read the rest of the post. Next, give examples to keep your readers interested.
Remember that a blog post should be interesting and provide educational content for readers.
How to Write Blog Posts That Sell
There’s no perfect answer to this question since it depends on what you’re trying to sell with your blog posts. However, you’ll want to make sure your posts are well-written, interesting, and relevant to your target audience.
Additionally, including images, videos, and other forms of multimedia can help to make your posts more engaging and visually appealing. Ultimately, if you want your blog posts to sell, you need to ensure they’re high quality and offer value to your readers.
A quality, regularly updated, SEO-friendly website can be a powerful tool for any small business owner. By providing valuable, informative, and well-written content to your audience, you can drive traffic to your website, increase conversions, and establish yourself as an industry expert.
Many businesses don’t blog because they don’t have the time or the ideas. Others simply don’t know where to start to write.
Here are my best tips for writing successful business blog posts:
1 Write for your readers
Your blog posts, like your web pages, are not for you. They’re for your readers, so write for them. Your blog should aim to solve customer problems or offer new insights about your field.
If you don’t know what to write about, start with the common questions your customers ask about your products. For example, if you are a jewelry retailer, you can post about how to identify real diamonds from fake ones.
2 Plan your blog posts
Many small business owners say they don’t have a blog because they don’t have the time or ideas. But, with a little bit of planning and scheduling, it’s easy to find time to write.
There are also content writing and editing tools that can save you time when you sit down to write. The Adwords tool is a great way to find keywords people use when searching for services like yours. The blog titles that you create can be based on these.
It’s a simple yet effective way to drive traffic to your website and let others know what you do. So, for the jeweler mentioned above, his blog post, based on the keyword research done using Google Adwords Keyword Tool, could be titled ‘how to buy a diamond ring.’
3 Create quality content
If you want your business to be successful, you need to publish quality content on your blog. This is how you build your site’s credibility.
Giving readers valuable information will encourage them to return to your site and make them more likely to purchase from you.
If writing isn’t your strong suit, or you don’t have the time, consider outsourcing your blogging to a professional. These writers will craft blog posts that appeal to your target customers and also help to drive more business for you.
Before you hit publish on your blog post, ask yourself if it is something you would want people to associate with your business. If the answer is no, work on the blog post a little more. Better yet, ask someone with a good eye for detail to look it over for you.
4 Frequency
How often should you post to your blog? Opinions are divided but aim to maintain a schedule that you can stick to.
Consistency is key. This is something that even professional bloggers struggle with it. Sometimes you just don’t feel like writing and other times you can’t find topics to write about.
Don’t beat yourself up when you miss your publishing schedule. Just don’t put too much pressure on yourself by committing to a schedule that is too tight for you.
When you can’t muster the motivation to write a new post, work on your old posts. By updating your content frequently, search engines will crawl your site more often, which will increase the visibility of your business.
5 Develop a writing style for your blog
Your company blog is a great place to show some personality and give people an idea of who you are. Keep your sales pitches to a minimum, and you’ll find that people will more likely respond and buy from you.
You’ll also find that people will more likely respond and buy your services. Since this is a business blog you are writing a blog to promote your products, try to use a professional tone, without being too formal.
6 Don’t make your posts to long (or too short)
As a rule of thumb, blog posts should be about 400-500 words. If your blog post is long, consider breaking it up into multiple posts.
Since people usually skim through online content, it’s important to make your words count.
7 Make your posts interactive
Just because you’re not getting any comments on your blog doesn’t mean that no one is reading it. Think of all the blogs and articles that you’ve read.
Many people don’t leave comments, but do you?
You will find that as your blog grows, more people will start leaving comments on your posts. If people aren’t leaving comments, try asking them with your CTAs. Ask them for any tips or points you may have missed in your post. That always gets people commenting.
8 Make your blog posts easy to share
Adding social media sharing buttons to your content makes it easy for readers to share your posts with their social networks.
These social media sharing buttons (example to the right) make it easy for readers to share your posts, driving traffic and potentially increasing conversions.
9 Measure the performance of your blog
If you want to make sure your website is performing as well as possible, you should utilize a web analytics program. One of the most popular options is Google Analytics, which can help you track your website’s performance.
Another useful tool is Google Search Console which gives you data on which searches your posts are showing up on Google for. It gives ideas on which keywords you should target when you update your old content.
10 Be patient – growing a successful blog takes time
As you continue to post more blogs, you’ll start to get a better picture of how readers are discovering your content. You’ll also be able to see what types of blog posts are most popular, so you’ll know what topics your audience likes to read about.
But make no mistake, growing your blog will take time, dedication, and effort. You are not going to write a blog and expect that it will be showing up for its target keywords on the first page of Google. You will need to prove to Google that you are a reliable source of factual information before the search engines can rank your pages.
How long should it take to write a blog post?
If you follow these steps, you can crank out a high-quality blog post in about 45 minutes of research, writing and outlining.
What tools can I use to write my business blog posts faster?
Ubersuggest is a great tool for researching blog post topics, finding ideas, and performing a competitive analysis. A voice-to-text tool can help you write faster by allowing you to dictate your blog post instead of typing it out.
Also, I suggest using a digital stopwatch or a timer to keep you on track.
How to Influence Your Readers and Make More Sales
There are several tricks of the blogging trade that you can incorporate into your posts to make them more engaging and increase their reach and ability to convert readers. Let’s look at 3 of the most effective:
- Use social proof.
The best way to influence someone is to show them that other people have already been influenced by you. That’s called social proof and it’s one of the most powerful persuasion techniques available.
If you have any kind of celebrity or well-known customer, make sure you mention it prominently on your sales page or in your ad copy. If they say something nice about you or your product, even better!
- Use a testimonial from a satisfied customer
It helps if you can include the customer’s photo on the testimonial. If you don’t have any customers yet, ask a friend or family member to give you a positive review that you can post on your site.
- Use scarcity.
People want what they can’t have …and if they think there’s a chance they might not be able to get it, they want it even more. You can use this psychological principle to increase sales by creating artificial scarcity around your products and services.
Examples: Only 10 spots left!, Offer ends at midnight!, Hurry while supplies last!
5 Best Blog Post Format for Promoting Your Products
To successfully promote your products and services in your blog, focus on providing valuable, relevant, educational, and engaging content to your readers.
Here are 5 blog post formats for posts that can wow customers enough to try your products:
1 Informational Posts
With informational blog posts, you aim to educate your readers about a topic they care about and is relevant for your business and your brand.
For instance, the blog posts on the Zenpost website are filled with useful information and tips to help marketers and business owners be more successful.
An educational blog post for an accounting company could detail a simple process for saving your business expenses or you could put together a series of related content… whether around P&L, saving on taxes, multi-currency business cards, or other related topics around business finance.
2 How-to posts that focus on solving a particular problem
Writing about problems your product or service solves is a great way to attract the right audience. The accounting firm can discuss how to deal with the IRS if they decide to investigate your tax return.
3 Question & answer posts
People may have questions about your business and it’s your job to answer them. If you are an e-commerce store, check the reviews that customers leave after purchasing for questions and concerns that keep coming up. Choose a few and right blog posts that address them directly.
If you are not an e-commerce store, try Google.
Look at what Google’s autocompleting feature suggests when typing in questions. This is what people are searching for. Let’s pretend the accounting firm is searching for “what taxes are” in Google.
The results of my Google search for “how to send a call directly to voicemail” are shown below. There are 10 potential blog post topics that the firm could write about.
4 Tutorial Posts
Tutorials are step-by-step guides that help readers accomplish a specific task. The topic should be relevant to your business and should help your readers achieve their goals.
Tutorials don’t have to be image heavy, but they can be.
For an accountancy firm, a tutorial on how to complete a specific task in popular accounting software, such as Quickbooks, would be useful to small business owners.
5 Customer story posts
Interviewing your customers for blog content is a fantastic way to generate interesting content for your readers. Tell stories in your blog that connect with readers on an emotional level.
Another option for collecting customer testimonials is to ask customers to record them on their own, so you can then post the videos or their transcripts to your blog.
Customer-created content is extremely powerful and can save you a lot of time. Your customers will do the creation for you.
Looking for some engaging content for your blog? Consider getting your clients to share their experiences with your services.
User-generated content is incredibly powerful, and it’s an easy way to get some great insight into how your accounting business has benefited other people.
Another example is the accounting firm asking their customers for stories about how they’ve overcome a taxing tax or financial issue. The blog post or YouTube video can end with a testimonial from the business, but it should not be solely about the accounting company.
Conclusion: How to Write a Blog for Your Business
Writing a blog to promote your business and products is a lot easier than you think. Because you are writing about familiar topics you can write more naturally – like you are pitching or advising a customer.
Finding topics to write about isn’t hard either. In fact, there are already there waiting for you to pick them and write. You must just know where to find them and the tools to use.
When it comes to writing business blog posts, the most important thing is to influence your readers in a way that encourages them to take action. By following the tips we have shared on how to write blog posts that sell, you’ll be well on your way to doing just that. Thanks for reading!
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