Reaching a potential customer today is quite a challenge, especially if our budget for advertising and promotion is very limited. However, there is a way to go out to the customer and show him that “our” products are worth buying. The right strategy allows you to stand out from the competition. One part of this strategy is a blog in an online store. Why is it worth running it? How to prepare entries? What to focus on? I will answer all these questions in the entry below. 🙂
A blog in an online store is a must today. Blogs are not only a tool that is perfect for PR activities, but also allows you to build your brand awareness among potential customers. Running a blog requires regularity, consistency and regularity. Let’s face it – valuable content is of great value. Writing articles takes time, thought and preparation – it is quite a laborious activity. However, it can bring spectacular results.
A blog in an online store – an important element of a content marketing strategy
A properly run company blog is a great opportunity to post valuable content on the Internet. It allows you to reach an ever-widergroup of recipients without investing a lot of money on advertising. A company blog is also the basis of successful SEO. Blog entries are the perfect opportunity to post relevant phrases and keywords for which you want to build the visibility of your website. Therefore, it is worth focusing on its development and regular posting of entries. According to the research, as many as 7 out of 10 people declare that they are more likely to buy the product described in the article than the one suggested by the ads. An example of an industry blog in the napnell.pl online store here.
A company blog is a way to build your position – free, reliable and valuable content is welcomed not only by users, but also by Google. Blog entries are also intended to arouse the need for a specific product in a potential client in an unobtrusive way.
Blog in an online store and SEO
The fact is that even the most visually refined online store will not bring profit if the customer will not have the opportunity to find it on the Internet. Most people get to the website through a search engine. So if you want your store to be profitable – it has to be visible. Visibility of the site in search engine results is increased by adding content on a regular basis, and a reliable knowledge and up-to-date site instills trust in the user, which is so important in online sales.
Let’s not hide, from an SEO perspective, a blog in an online store – meaning new, regularly published posts are new sub-pages, containing important phrases and keywords. It is much better to place them naturally in the text than to force them into product or category descriptions.
When planning article topics, try to include keywords that are searched by internet users. Thanks to this your blog will be visited by people looking for advice or inspiration – a group of regular readers can turn into potential customers at any time.
On a blog it is worth to place both typical sales entries, which will contain links to the searched products from your offer, but also tutorials, which are searched and read most often. If a user finds an answer to his/her question, he/she will surely come back in a while or, what is important, will go to your store’s website to make a purchase.
Blog in an online store – how to create interesting and valuable content?
We do not have to be qualified specialists in the field of science to be able to create valuable, fully substantive content that we will share on the company blog. Of course, this does not mean that running a blog does not require knowledge from us. Remember, however, that the article need not be a scientific essay, dominated by smart-sounding, complicated and, worst of all, incomprehensible terms for the reader. In this case, the point is not to delight recipients with our eloquence, but to adjust the language to their needs, level of awareness and show that we perfectly know their needs, which we meet. ow to create interesting and valuable texts at the same time? Here are some great tips:
Communicating directly to the blog readers
It sounds logical, but in fact many artists forget about it completely. What does this mean in practice? First of all, we must not forget that the text and form should be strictly adapted to the specificity of the recipients – the text addressed to young people should look different, differently to new parents, and also differently to specialists in a given field. A blog in an online store is also not a place for subjective expression of the author’s opinion. Let’s try to present the topic discussed in the text in such a way that the reader himself can develop an opinion on a given topic. Let’s not forget that the topics should be interesting – so if you run, for example, a health food store, don’t limit yourself only to articles aimed at praising your brand. This could be perceived by readers as intrusive advertising, and we certainly don’t want that.
Make your readers want to come back for more content
This is the primary goal of anyone who blogs content in an online store. How to achieve this goal? In addition to the attractive style, substantive content and interesting content, it is worth arousing the curiosity of readers by making them visit the blog regularly to read the next text. A good solution in this case will be a series of thematic articles. Referring to the previously mentioned example concerning a health food store – you can start a series of articles concerning e.g. various types of baking or recipes based on a specific product, or recipes for dishes typical for a specific kitchen using the store’s assortment.
Plan for creating articles in the online store
Remember from your school days when your Polish language teacher encouraged you to prepare a framework plan for your text? Introduction, development, conclusion – exactly the same method should reign when creating a blog for an online store. This way you will not only arrange in your head what you want to convey to your readers, but also streamline the content creation process – you won’t have to think on the fly what you should write about. Remember that the introduction should be a short preview of what the reader will find in the development – if in the first few sentences you do not sufficiently encourage the recipient to read the text, you will not “promise” him/her that in the rest of the article he/she will find the answers to the questions he/she is asking, do not count on the fact that even the most substantive text will enjoy recognition
Getting inspired by other blogs of online stores
It’s not about copying your ideas for articles from competitors, but reading the needs of your readers and potential customers. If your site visitors regularly ask about specific questions, let’s take that into account when creating your guidance text. If we run activities in Social Media, Facebook or Instagram is the perfect field to encourage recipients to visit a blog in an online store – it is worth considering preparing a post or report (in the case of Instagram, a survey can also be a good option) asking what they would like to know about. read on a blog in an online store, you can propose two options for the topic and let the recipients decide – thanks to this, we will not only meet them, make them feel that they are important to you, but also respond to their needs, which in turn will have a positive effect not only for the process of building brand awareness, but also for conversion purposes.
Wall of text for a blog in an online store
Online readers belong to the instant generation – they do not like to waste time reading the entire text if the article does not provide answers to their questions at first glance. Besides, the wall of text blending together does not look attractive in any way. So let’s not forget about using headers that will also translate into SEO issues. Let us include in them the announcements of what we want to develop in the next text blocks. Let’s interweave the texts with graphics that will not only take care of the visual aspects of the article, but will also be an eye-catching variety of the content. Graphic content also allows you to better assimilate the content – infographics, charts – all this will make the readers “get” more from the text, making them more likely to come back for another portion of knowledge or news
Regularity in creating a blog in an online store (h3)
When deciding to run a blog in an online store, we must first determine what processing capacity we have – you or your team. Regularity is essential! Remember that not only readers pay attention to this – search engines also index and track new content – so if you choose regularity, your rankings will be higher, which will translate into positioning over time.
Interaction with blog readers in the online store
Combining activities on SM channels with publications on a blog is a good solution, but remember that the interaction with the audience should not end at this point. So if there are questions or comments under an article, we should not ignore them. We write back and pay attention to the merits of the comments. This also applies to the words of criticism – a dissatisfied customer or a reader who does not agree with the vision presented by us in the article should not be treated in advance – on the contrary. We should show that as a brand, we value constructive criticism, and the opinion of each recipient is important to us – this will also have a positive impact on the process of building brand awareness, which will pay off in the future!
Summary
An online store blog is a great way to build brand awareness among potential customers. With posts, you can be closer to them, let them get to know not only your products, but also the company and its employees behind the scenes. Such a direct turn towards the customer will engage them and encourage them to get to know the store and its product range deeper. Regardless of what industry you operate in – it is worth maintaining a company blog. You can prepare entries on your own or engage specialists who, using their knowledge and experience, will help you adjust the type of content to the needs of users. Thanks to regular publication of entries your website will become more credible both for Google and for potential customers.
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