I am sure many organisations can relate to hitting publish on their blog and expecting the comments and shares to be rolling in. But instead it’s the opposite with minimal or no activity. According to O’Dell (2011), many consumers choose to follow a firms blog to keep tabs on the brand they love, the expertise they share, along with, as according to ‘Technorati’s 2013 Digital Influence Report’, turning to blogs when looking to make purchases (see image below). Organisational blogs are ranking higher in trust and influence over other online services showing it is important to increase a blog’s following.

 

 

As Fournier, et al, (2012) states, the creation and management of customer relationships is fundamental to the practice of marketing, with a keen interest in relationships: what they are, why they are formed, what effects they have on consumers and the marketplace, how they can be measured and when and how they evolve and decline. Blogs can have huge impact on business success with effective intelligence and planning.

Reasons for operating a blog

• Companies blogging have 97% more inbound links
• 92% of companies blogging multiple times per day have acquired a customer from their blog
• B2B marketers who blog generate 67% more leads than those who don’t
• 23% of total Internet usage time is devoted to social networks or blogs
• 61% of U.S. online consumers have made a purchase based on recommendations from a blog
• 33% of B2B companies use blogs – don’t fall behind 
• Small businesses that blog get 126% more lead growth than small businesses that don’t

The above shows how influential a blog can be and the impact it can have on readers. As Walker (2016) explains, a blog is where you can point social media fans and followers, accumulating a vast amount of information for existing and potential customers; where your expertise and thought leadership will really stand out. Business blogs can allow the firm to engage with people and build the brand, increasing their following.

Although many organisations realise the potential of blogs and encourage their employees to blog, a good proportion, as according to Aggarwal, et al, (2012), are skeptical about losing control over this new media. Companies fear employees may write negative things about them, leading to a reputation loss. Therefore, companies show mixed responses towards negative posts on employee blogs. Aggarwal, et al, (2012) research reveals a potential positive to negative posts. Their analysis shows negative posts act as a catalyst and can exponentially increase the readership of employee blogs, suggesting that companies should permit employees to make negative posts. This is largely due to employees writing a few negative posts and many positive posts, meaning the increase in readership of employee blogs should be enough to offset the negative effect of a few negative posts. Therefore, not restraining negative posts to increase readership should be a good strategy in increasing the organisations blog following. This is due to, as Dean (2010) suggests, blogging captures the users in intensive networks of enjoyment, production, and surveillance.

If you have not yet started your blog, the following ‘how to start a business blog in 5 steps‘ will help you start your content marketing journey. Check out the top content marketing blogs.

Methods for increasing your blog following

Once your organisation has set up their blog, you can increase your following with a number of techniques:

• Garrett Moon states companies are not sharing their content anywhere near what they should be. As many will miss the initial communications, you need to share each blog multiple times. For example, you may tweet or Facebook share your post as soon as you hit publish, but this needs to happen on multiple occasions. The below image produced by Garrett Moon shows how you can easily double your traffic from social media. Some may see this as being spammed with the same content, but others will see it as the value promised as they may not have recognised initial communications. You should change the message on each post and tailor it to the social media used.

• Once you write 21-54 blog posts, blog traffic generation increases by up to 30% showing a method in improving traffic to your blog is by sticking at it.
• Matthew Barby states that to increase your following, the key is to get influencers to write for you, with his guide to achieving this.
• Ross Hudgens investigates how 73% are not using a powerful Twitter tactic and not getting the text right. It is essential to get the text right to encourage followers to click on your post.
• With blogging and social media, organisations can improve their SEO as these generate inbound links (DeMers, 2015), generating referral traffic to websites, helping increase awareness, and leverage influencers to help grow your business.

To find out even more ways to increase your blog following, click here.

Conclusion

It is easy to build a blog, but hard to build a successful blog with large traffic. With 33% of B2B companies using blogs, it is essential that your organisation also operates this form of media, as you do not want their following to grow massively and leave your company behind. As blogs are becoming more important in consumer buying decisions, as Muntinga, et al, (2011) suggests, consumer empowerment shows the consumers ability to promote a brand and convince peers with their own social network, like Twitter, that it’s worth purchasing, creating engaging electronic-word-of-mouth. Both social media and blogs complement each other and should be used in tandem to increase a companies following. It’s difficult to maintain an active social media presence without access to high-quality content, which is provided from blogs. Sharing others content is good, but you want to be directing the reader to your own website to increase your following. As you share your blog on social media, you increase traffic to your website, and ultimately your blog following.

 

For further information, you may find the following sites of interest:

How to easily double your traffic from social media

21 tactics to increase blog traffic

The 5 golden rules of blogging and why you should follow them

 

References

Aggarwal, R., Gopal, R., Sankaranarayanan, R., Singh, PV. (2012) Blog, Blogger, And The Firm: Can Negative Employee Posts Lead To Positive Outcomes?. Information Systems Research 23.2: 306-322.

Dean, J. (2010) Blog Theory: feedback and capture in the circuits of drive. Cambridge, UK: Polity.

DeMers, J. (2015) The Top 10 Benefits of Blogging On Your Website. [Online]. Available at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2015/05/28/the-top-10-benefits-of-blogging-on-your-website/#2715e4857a0b30d059325b65 [Accessed 14 Apr. 16]

Fournier, S., Breazeale, M,. Fetscherin, M., Keller, K. (2012) Consumer-brand relationships: theory and practice. International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS).

Muntinga, D., Moorman, M., Smit, E. (2011) Exploring motiva­tions for brand-related social media use. International Journal of Advertising, 30(1), p13–46.

O’Dell J. (2011) Why do people follow brands. [Online] Available at: http://mashable.com/2011/06/30/why-people-follow-brands/#ZnZCIgE0vGql [Accessed 13 Apr. 2016)

Walker, C. (2016) How to start a business blog in 5 steps. [Online] Available at: http://writtent.com/blog/how-to-start-a-blog-a-step-by-step-guide-to-creating-a-business-blog-part-1/ [Accessed 14 Apr. 2016)