By The Pollack Group
By Liza Manukian, Pollack Group Spring Intern
From beauty blog to multi-million dollar company, Glossier is now a skincare and makeup brand that rose to fame through digital content creation. Within just a year of launching Into the Gloss, the blog was averaging 10 million page views a month. How was this happening? The key was producing compelling, and surprisingly personal, content on a consistent basis. Blogging allows companies to connect with a broad audience in a place where they spend the most time – online.
Does it feel sometimes like the need for frequent posting becomes redundant in nature? The urgency to publish multiple times a week can make one question if a post is even beneficial. However, if pulled off correctly, blogs can give brands and companies a marketing edge for a variety of reasons:
1. Social Sharing/Spark of Engagement
Over the years, blogging has evolved into a place where the content can be fun and interactive, instead of only serious and formal. Blogging offers what many other forms of marketing can not: an ability to be shared and critiqued to create a flow of engagement. Who is sharing the content on social media? What particular comments are being made by readers? By giving content the ability to be shared online, marketers can see the exact types of people that value what the content is about. Studying the people that make an effort to share and engage in a company’s content can turn into an incredible marketing tool.
2. Budget-Friendly
What better way to stay within the company’s budget than using blogging as a marketing strategy? Creating a blog can cost next to nothing, and posting several times a week will only cost time rather than additional out-of-pocket expenses. Less money spent on writing blogs means more resources toward creating video or photo content that can accompany a blog or be used for plenty of other digital marketing purposes. Hiring an intern to help or inviting a guest blogger to create content as a form of exposure are other key ways that will help your company expand its network without raising the budget.
3. Drives Traffic
A blog should be thought of as a gateway to reach and grab the attention of as many users as possible. How is that done? One major way is to increase the volume of content. Believing in quality over quantity is key, but the decision to ramp up on the number of posts per week can drive traffic instantly. According to The Business of Blogging, Into The Gloss increased the frequency of posts from three times a week to three times a day and noticed a “tripling of traffic almost overnight”. Expanding one’s audience through frequent quality content can bring in business quicker than one might think.
4. Better than Advertising
Few things are more obnoxious and intrusive than digital ads. In a 2018 study, more than half percent of respondents believe websites should host fewer ads. When you have a blog, you are able to advertise your company in a great way without having to overwhelm anyone in the process. As marketers, blogs need to function as an advertisement for users because it is a more positive and engaging way to drive in traffic. Instead of promoting the company with the same pervasive message that always pops up, blogs engage your readers with quality content so that it seems less interruptive.
5. Transparency to an Audience
A blog is much different than any other function on a company website, allowing audience engagement in a storytelling way. Trustworthiness and honesty within a blog can bring a sense of vulnerability that one might not see in other marketing blogs or campaigns. This sense of vulnerability can make a brand stand out in the world of digital content. It allows companies to provide valuable information along with in-depth content via blogging, all while building a better relationship with their audience.
For more agency insights, visit our WellRed archives
