For many Internet users, blogs are often reduced to personal blogs maintained and animated by individuals to talk about their passions or write open columns, neighborhood news, or other kinds of blogs. However, with the rise of brand content and the importance of good SEO to stand out from the competition, many companies today have or want to create a blog. It is essential to have such a digital communication tool to speak, assert your expertise, be seen, or share ideas, advice, or news. It is often associated with a showcase site or an e-commerce site.
More community-based, the blog responds to Internet users’ need to be heard, speak out, be listened to, and “consume” content in quantity without compromising quality because the competition is fierce between all blogs. The blog has become a communication channel by force of circumstances and the weight it takes in the modes of consumption of content, acquisition of qualified traffic, and business for companies in B2B or B2C. Personal blogs are also very popular and can even be profitable for writers as long as their audience is of good quality. 1st Position, web writing agency and expert in SEO since 1999, gives you the keys to create a free blog that generates visits and a quality audience thanks to some optimizations and a real strategy.
WHAT IS A BLOG?
A blog is an online newspaper or news website that displays information in reverse chronological order: latest posts appearing first. It is a platform where the copywriter or editors share their views on a given topic.
So what is a blog for? There are many reasons to create a blog for personal use or a business to share with its target and customers. Made very popular and predominant in the consumption of content, blogging sometimes offers individuals or companies the possibility to earn money or receive compensation. This is all the more true as a company to make itself known, share company news, novelties, give advice, retain customers … Historical company in its sector or a young startup, all companies are interested in creating a blog. Thus, a blog’s main objective is to connect a business with its audience, its target. Another is to increase your traffic and generate lead quality.
The more frequent your blog posts and the better they are, the more likely you will have the blog (and your business) to be discovered and visible to your target audience. This means that a blog is an effective lead generation tool. With good calls-to-action (CTAs), it will convert your website traffic into high-quality leads and even customers. In terms of reputation and branding, a blog also allows you to showcase your authority and build a brand. When you use your knowledge and resources to create informative and engaging posts, it builds your audience’s confidence. Great blogging makes your business more credible, which is especially important if your brand is still young and fairly unknown. It ensures both presence and authority.
WHY CREATING A BLOG IMPROVES THE SEO OF A SITE?
Creating a blog on an existing website improves the SEO of the site as a whole. For this reason, nearly every organization is involved, whether it’s a showcase site or an e-commerce site, has a blog. However, a blog or not is a positioning factor for search engines; it is above using it to be important. If you have a frequently updated blog with topics important to your audience and high-quality blog posts, it will help your website achieve higher rankings for search engine searches. This is for several reasons.
CREATE FRESH CONTENT
Search engines appreciate frequently updated websites. This allows them to offer more “fresh” content rather than articles dated a few years ago. They want to publish the most recent content possible to ensure that it is also useful for internet users. Thus, creating a blog and articles promote a better referencing of a site; this also concerns the old updated articles!
Most sites don’t have the opportunity to change their content: Corporate page (History, About, Recruitment, etc.), product pages, or prices will rarely if ever, change. You can optionally update the content of your home page, but this change is limited. Thus, starting a blog allows you to post new articles constantly.
POSITION YOURSELF ON NEW KEYWORDS
The more pages you have to index for the search engines, the more possibilities you have to take on the results pages, and this on more varied keywords. Imagine each blog post as an entry to your site; a post well positioned on popular queries represents a greater gateway to the site and, therefore, more visitors. Every blog post you publish gives you a new opportunity to use useful SEO keywords in your content. By doing keyword research and selecting the right phrases, you will increase your website’s visibility and traffic.
GET BACKLINKS
Backlinks from external websites that redirect to your page. They are essential in a natural referencing SEO strategy: the reputation index of a site is improved, which increases the chances of finding itself in the first positions of a search page on a search engine like Google (SERP ). To obtain backlinks, it is often necessary to act as an expert or an authority in his field or create relevant content for Internet users. Thus, creating a blog often allows you to obtain backlinks and increase popularity and, therefore, the entire site’s referencing.
To achieve its goal, it makes sense to build relationships with other organizations and websites. Blogs allow you to include links to other relevant websites. In return, these organizations can link to your site, which will help you generate even more web traffic than you could generate on your own.
INCREASED VISIBILITY ON GOOGLE AND SOCIAL NETWORKS
If you regularly write articles, you could become eligible and be published on Google News or Google Discover. These unique Google search features allow you to gain visibility without doing more effort than simply posting content regularly.
Plus, a good article often gets shares on social media. Partners, collaborators, or strangers could relay your article on their profiles, which increases your popularity on the web.
REFERENCING IMAGES
No blog post, no images. And who says image, says image referencing. You are surely not without knowing Google Images and the equivalents among its colleagues. They are inexhaustible sources of traffic and leads. By posting blog posts with optimized images, you will increase your visibility and improve your SEO!
HOW TO PROPERLY REFERENCE YOUR BLOG AND ATTRACT VISITORS?
Now that you know more about blogging, it’s time to figure out how to improve your blog’s SEO, attract visitors, and make it profitable. Regardless of the industry, starting a blog and producing great quality content is always helpful in generating business. It is still necessary that it ranks on the search engines. To acquire qualified traffic, convert it and more generally improve your brand image, follow these steps to boost your positioning on the most important keywords. Use your time and resources intelligently and efficiently!
1. AUDIENCE AND TARGET STUDY
Before knowing how to properly reference your blog or know what to write, you should ask yourself who you will write this blog and its content for? Indeed, like any communication action, you must think about the target of the message. Be sure that skipping this step won’t save you time or money in the long run. By choosing precisely your audience, you will be able to understand their needs and expectations. As a reminder, the audience is made up of all the readers of your blog. Ideally, your target audience, your potential customers, should be included in your audience to maximize the chances of converting visitors into customers, traffic into business. If you have few resources to allocate to your blog, it is even the target to focus on first. Bet on the quality of the audience rather than the quantity!
It is very likely that you already have a pretty good idea of who you are targeting and who you want to reach with your blog posts. However, it would be worthwhile to conduct some research to confirm your hypotheses. If you already have a website, search your visitors’ demographic data, especially their center of interest, in the “Audience” tab. Also, do a quick search on social networks, forums, and collaborative information platforms like Quora, for example.
2. KEYWORD RESEARCH
Before embarking on writing blog articles, keyword research consists of researching, listing, selecting, and targeting queries, popular or not, likely to attract qualified traffic to maximize the results. Chances of converting visitors into customers. Right now, it is essential to know that every page of a website (and therefore of a blog) must target one or more well-chosen keywords. We choose the strategic keywords according to the search volume, the keyword’s relevance, or the feasibility (competition). Too many people completely ignore the keyword research stage when it comes to blogging. This is a lost opportunity because you are not putting in place everything it takes to have a blog that performs over the long term.
Among the keyword research tools, we can mention Mazen, SEO campaign management software by the agency Optimiz. me, Semrush, Yoda Insight, keyword planning tool, Ubbersuggest …
WORK ON A BLOG’S SEARCH INTENT
If you already have a website and recent keyword research, know that it’s time to do a new blog-specific search. Indeed, the search intent is not the same on a blog post or a category page, or a product page. The search intention corresponds to the need underlying the Internet user’s expectations hiding in a request. Being relevant and referencing well requires understanding and responding to the research intent.
POSITION YOURSELF ON TRENDS
Blog posts also allow you to target hot, trending topics that are not worth dedicating to permanent site content. You can capture traffic when the query is popular before the searches drop off after the trend ends.
Tools to find long-tail keywords: BuzzSumo, Google Trends mainly, Twitter Trend…
WRITE PERSISTENT ARTICLES
In contrast, blogs, articles on trends, practices, products, guides, definitions, or FAQs provide excellent evergreen content, which does not expire, which positions but can continue well Position and drive traffic for months even years to come. To do this, it is often a good idea to update and enrich them to show Google that the content remains fresh and relevant.
AIM FOR LONG TAIL KEYWORDS
Optimizing your blog posts for keywords isn’t about incorporating as many keywords as possible into your posts. It hurts your SEO because search engines see keyword stuffing as bad for a good reading experience. It will be smarter to focus on long-tail keywords. These longer keywords, often question-based, allow your post to focus on your audience’s specific goals. For example, the keyword “how to choose a 4K TV” has much more SEO impact than the short keyword “4K TV”.
Website visitors with long queries are more likely to read the entire post before asking for more information. In other words, they’ll help you generate the right kind of traffic – the one that converts.
Tools to find long-tail keywords: Google Suggest or Autocomplete, Searches associated with a generic term, Answer The Public, Thematic forums, Google Trends…
3. ELABORATION OF THE CONTENT STRATEGY
Now that you know the target and understand what Internet users are typing to find solutions or a value proposition like yours, creating a blog requires finding an adequate content strategy to respond to Internet users, promote your services and stay consistent with your brand. Content strategy refers to the management and production of content: texts, images, videos, podcasts, etc., for a brand. It should make it possible to underline the identity of the brand and its expertise in its sector. It is a huge growth lever for companies wishing to gain visibility, notoriety, and business.
Answer the following questions to build a successful content strategy:
- Who is my target?
- What is my added value compared to competitors?
- What is my area of expertise?
- What will be the editorial tone?
- What are my broadcast relays?
- What type of content to broadcast?
- How often do I post?
- What is my editorial schedule?
So important step, creating a content strategy that will perform must be the subject of a study by professionals such as an editorial agency or a content marketing agency as 1st Position.
4.PRODUCTION AND WRITING OF CONTENT
To publish on a blog, it is necessary to produce content regularly to increase the chances of being noticed by Google and Internet users by positioning many pages on the maximum number of keywords possible. While regular publication is important, it should not come at the cost of quality. Prefer a few relevant, targeted and rich articles to reach the first page of Google rather than dozens that get stuck on page 3 or 4, where no one goes. For this, you must think of Internet users and optimize your content for search engines and natural referencing of articles.
Here are some ways to improve the SEO of your blog by optimizing the articles:
- Use a rich semantic field around the keyword with a writing assistance tool such as Optimiz Content
- Add keywords sparingly
- Define better quality meta-titles and meta-descriptions that include your main keyword
- Use Hn markup
- Write complete content
- Add ALT tags on images for image SEO
- Integrate structured data to make the text easier to understand by Google
- Write in the most natural language possible
- Optimize your URL structure
- Add internal and external links to improve mesh and navigation
- Update or remove outdated content
Do you want to promote your business? Are you seeking persuasive SEO Services? Touch base with us. We offer SEO services in Pakistan at an economical price.
