business blog

By Rieva Lesonsky

Is your business blog really working for you as a marketing tool? Wouldn’t it be great if you could get 10,000 readers a month, generating leads and boosting sales? To learn what the best business bloggers do differently, keep reading.

A study by Curata, Business Blogging Secrets Revealed, examined the habits of a group of business bloggers they called the “10K Business Blog Club”—those who average more than 10,000 page views for their blogs every month. While most of these companies were midsized rather than truly small, they do have some actions in common that you can learn from.

  • They put in the time. You can’t expect instant results from a blog. Seventy percent of bloggers in the 10K Club have blogged for two years or more; nearly half of those in the Club have blogged for over five years. However, duration alone is no guarantee of success. What else do 10K Club members do differently?
  • They publish quality content and do so frequently. A whopping 90.5% of the 10K Club post to their blogs at least once a week. However, they’re focused on quality, not just quantity. 10K Club members are more likely than average bloggers to report that more than half of their posts are 500 words or more.

I know, I know—that’s a lot of writing. No wonder 10K Club members rely on outsourcing to generate the content for their blogs. Nearly one-fourth of their content is written by freelancers, compared to about 12 percent for average bloggers.

  • They see blogging as one part of the overall marketing mix. 10K Club members understand that social media, the business website and the overall online presence must work together with the business blog to promote the business.
  • They aren’t afraid to spend a little money. The 10K Club enlist experts when needed to help them promote their content; they also use paid promotional tools such as online advertising or ads on social media to attract more attention.
  • They ask blog writers to promote their content. Whether in-house employees are blogging, whether you’re using freelancers or a content provider service, ask blog authors to promote what they write on social media and elsewhere. It builds their credibility as well as yours.
  • They use email newsletters. Promoting your blog content in your company’s email newsletter works, because you’re providing your audience something they want—useful information.
  • They measure results. Last, but not least, 10K Club members really pay attention to analytics. However, they don’t just measure page views or how many people are sharing their content on social media; they measure the bottom-line effect blog readership has on sales, such as generating leads or converting buyers.

Making a business blog work is hard work, no doubt about it—but if you put in the time, effort and promotion, it can pay off in big ways.