Spark Business with Blogs
Looking for a low–cost option to market your small business? Look no further than the screen and keyboard you visit each day and create a blog page!
Blog posts are a great way to increase traffic to your website and engage customers. You can also attract new clients by promoting the assets that separate your business from the competition.
Getting Started
Adding a blog page to your existing website is ideal. Hosting the page on your site offers three primary benefits.
It will bring readers directly to your website.
The blog page will have a look that is consistent with your site design.
Tracking statistics will be centralized, making it easier to analyze performance.
If you don’t have the staff or expertise to add a page to your website, there are many platforms available to help create your blog page. Search “create blog page” and review your options. There are sites that offer free trial periods and provide design templates, help guides, and webinars to get you started.
Content and Additional Tools
Blog topics should apply to your business and customer audience, but don’t limit yourself to writing about your products or services only. A broader range of topics relevant to your business will appeal to a larger audience. Also, search for trending topics that can be tied to your industry.
Let’s say, for example, you own an Italian restaurant. You can write content about your cuisine, a profile on your chef, and menu specials, but you can also mix in blogs about — Italy. You could write about nutrition, fitness, travel, or how to become a chef. Perhaps a trending topic is restaurants that offer gluten–free or low–carb entrees. You can write about these topics and include the options available at your restaurant.
There are additional tools that you’ll need to optimize traffic and audience retention. For example, blogs with photos are more appealing to readers. According to Jeff Bullas, who was cited by Forbes as one of the world’s top social marketing talents, articles with images receive 94 percent more total views than articles without an image. This means you’ll need access to stock photos.
There are license–free stock photo websites that offer free trial periods and reasonable membership fees. Other tools that will add depth and effectiveness to your blog page include:
Social media sharing buttons
Email marketing
SMS marketing and live chat
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Video editing/conferencing
Customizing images
Spelling/Grammar checks
Best Times to Share on Social Media
The value of a great blog article is dependent on readership. So when are the best times to share content on social media? Sprout Social conducted research to identify the peak engagement times for the most popular social media platforms for digital marketing — Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, and Twitter.
According to Sprout, Wednesday is the best day to post. Another consistent result from their research is to avoid posting on weekends. Here are the recommended times for each of the four most popular channels.
SOCIAL MEDIA IN GENERAL
Mondays from 10 a.m. to noon
Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Wednesdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Thursdays 9 a.m. to noon
Fridays from 9 to 11 a.m.
Best days to post on social media: Tuesdays and Wednesdays
Worst days to post on social media: Sundays
Mondays from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Tuesdays from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Wednesdays from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Thursdays from 8 a.m. to noon
Best days to post on Facebook: Mondays through Thursdays
Worst days to post on Facebook: Sundays
Mondays from 10 a.m. to noon
Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Wednesdays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Fridays from 9 to 11 a.m.
Best days to post on Instagram: Tuesdays and Wednesdays
Worst days to post on Instagram: Sundays
Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 10 a.m. to noon
Best days to post on LinkedIn Company Pages: Tuesdays through Thursdays
Worst days to post on LinkedIn Company Pages: Weekends
TIKTOK
Tuesdays from 2 to 6 p.m.
Wednesdays from 2 to 5 p.m.
Thursdays from 3 to 5 p.m.
Best days to post on TikTok: Tuesdays and Wednesdays
Worst days to post on TikTok: Sundays
Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Wednesdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Fridays 9 a.m. to noon
Best days to post on Twitter: Tuesdays through Thursdays
Worst days to post on Twitter: Sundays
Use blogs to tell the story of your company, increase your customer base, and show you’re up–to–date with industry trends. It’s a time investment that can produce real dollars.
