Why Business Blogging Works

Every month, I run a new hire training class on blogging. While many of the people in that class know why blogging is important for business growth, I'm supposed to teach it as if that's not the case. That's because we never want to assume everyone understands inbound marketing just because we live and breathe it every day, and this class is meant toequip everyone with the ability to explain a core tenet of inbound -- business blogging -- to anyone that asks.

Fresh off the heels of last month's training class, I realized it's a little ridiculous that I've never written a post that explains business blogging in those terms on this very blog. If you search for the content we've published on blogging, it runs the gamut from thought leadership, to optimization tips, to practical tips, to nitty gritty advanced nuances. But I never simply wrote aboutwhy it works.

So ... here's why it works.

First, let's get on the same page about what a blog is.

这是我最喜欢的博客定义，其中最重要的部分要大胆地理解：

A blog is a website with经常更新的内容about a specific关键字 - 面向主题topic。

A blog must beupdated frequently-- so it's not a static part of your website, like your homepage or your About page.

And it's about a特定主题-- not anything/everything in the wide world. For example, this blog writes about inbound marketing, because we sell inbound marketing software. We不写有关狗美容，时尚或确保您的房屋贷款率低的款项 - 因为我们没有出售与任何这些东西有关的任何东西。

Okay, so who reads blogs?

Well, lots of people, but for the purposes of this post, let's focus on the two important groups:

1. Search Engines:Search engines like Google "read" blogs to learn what your website is about, so they know whether they can return any of your website pages to their users who perform searches. For example, Google reads our website, so it knows it can return this blog post if someone searches "Why does blogging work?"
2. 潜在客户：潜在客户阅读博客以找到有用的行业内容。

现在，您可能会对自己说：“我的潜在客户不阅读博客。”我的朋友。您可能会说您的潜在客户不subscribe到博客。但这并不意味着他们在网上进行研究时不会偶然发现博客文章。

For example, when I was looking to buy a new TV, I went to Google to perform some research to figure out what my best option would be. I learned from technology bloggers what my best options were, and then went to make a purchase based off their advice.

I don't subscribe to any of those tech blogs -- and I may not always even realize what I'm reading is a "blog" -- but I use blogs to figure out where I want to spend my money.

Knowing all that ... why does blogging work to grow your business?

Because blogging helps you growtrafficand相信。让我分解我的意思。

Blogging helps you drive moretraffic到您的网站。

Every time you publish a blog post, it's a new opportunity for someone to find your business' website and learn who you are. Said another way, it's an opportunity to drive traffic to your website.

For example, every time I write a blog post on this very blog about inbound marketing, it creates an opportunity for someone that needs help with inbound marketing to find that post about inbound marketing, and learn who HubSpot is. The more blog posts I create, then, the more chances I have to introduce HubSpot to someone new.拥有100篇博客文章的企业正在创造100个新的机会，以在线找到其网站。一家拥有500篇博客文章的企业正在创造500个新的机会，以在线找到其网站。

博客（作为一种格式）提供了这些机会，就像您网站的其他部分所不允许的那样，因为您发布的每个博客文章都是全新的URL。考虑一下，如果没有博客，您可以添加多少个新页面URL。嗯...关于页面。工作页面。产品/服务页面。还有什么？一段时间后，您将开始刮擦枪管的底部。但是，如果您有一个博客，那么您将有无穷无尽的机会创建新的页面URL，这些URL可以在搜索中排名，并被尚不了解您的业务的人们发现。博客为您提供了无尽的机会进入网上。

Not only does blogging helps you get more traffic to your website -- it helps you getreally good traffic。How? Because you can write about things that will bring in the type of lead you want to sell to. That's why we don't blog about dog grooming and home loans. We blog about inbound marketing --because we have something to sell to people that are interested in doing inbound marketing。Blogging helps you tailor the audience you bring in to your website, so they're people that would conceivably purchase your product or service.

Blogging helps you establish相信。

您想从谁那里购买汽车...一个花时间通过提供免费，公正，教育内容或您一生中从未见过或交谈过的人来教育您的汽车？

前者，对吗？

博客可以帮助您进入该营地。人们从认识和信任的人那里购买。（希望，喜欢。）通过投资创建内容来帮助您的目标客户回答问题，您正在建立一种信任关系，使他们更自在地作为业务合作伙伴或解决方案提供商投资于您。

Look, traffic and trust are nice, but what I really want are leads.

That's what blogging helps you get!

You know how we talked about blogging opening up opportunities to bring in new traffic?您网站上登陆的每个人也代表着一个新的潜在客户的机会。如果您写了100个人阅读的博客文章，您有100个机会将这些读者变成线索在该博客文章中提起诉讼。文字-动作是什么,再问ader to exchange their contact information for something -- like a free ebook, a free checklist, a free consultation, etc.

以后,有人在做阅读一篇博文阿布t inbound marketing on this blog, they might want to learn more about it. If they do, they can find the call-to-action at the end of the blog post that offers a free ebook about inbound marketing, and fill out a form to receive it. That person is now a lead, and they might end up becoming a customer one day.

The cherry on top?

博客是不断捐赠的礼物。一旦您发布了博客文章，它就在互联网上正在努力引入新的流量和引线forever。So even if we published a post several years ago about inbound marketing, people can still find that post in search engines like Google, or on social media if people still share it after reading it themselves.

In other words, blogging can literally help you generate leads for your business while you sleep. The work you put in today can generate results for years and years to come. (Compare that to PPC -- when you turn off the money, the traffic and leads turn off, too.)

它可以帮助我将博客视为年金。如果您今天发布一篇博客文章，则可能会驱动50次访问。太好了，但是随着时间的流逝，它会滴入，每月10个访问 - 在最初的交通涌入后，这似乎令人沮丧。这就是为什么您不在筒仓中查看单个博客文章的表现的原因。如果您查看收益随着时间的流逝而随着时间的推移发布后的发布后，帖子后发布帖子，那么这些访问将在搜索中排名时彼此堆叠。现在，您拥有一个多样化的投资组合，一个月又一个月又可以推动一致的回报 - 您没有额外的工作。

因此，如果您对休假感到内gui，请告诉人们不要担心 - 您的博客文章会在您离开时照顾好事。