Business Blogging Part 2
Why business blogging beats other traffic strategies
Business blogging is superior to other methods of driving traffic to your website. Search engine algorithms play a big role in determining what belongs in your traffic strategy. When search engines change the way they rank pages, it’s time to review your website’s traffic strategy.
How often do you have to blog to be effective?
This question doesn’t have a specific numerical answer. It’s best to blog “regularly” – at the frequency that suits you, as long as your preferred frequency isn’t “once in a blue moon.” The more you use your blog, the more effective it will become. Remember, each blog post gets indexed separately in search engines, so the more you blog, the more opportunities you have to reach visitors. If your blog posts cover a variety of subjects that are related to your business, you expand your reach and improve the SEO value of your blog content.
Is using a blog more effective than placing articles in an article directory?
In a word, yes. The idea behind article directories is that they provide a ready source of content on a vast array of subjects. The content is loaded with links to the websites of article contributors. The content provides inbound links to your site from the third parties that publish (or more accurately republish) the articles you place in the directory.
Here’s the big problem with article directories. Search engines like inbound links, but search engines don’t like duplicate content. If an article with links to your site gets published in more than one place, you may not only NOT benefit from multiple inbound links, you may actually end up hurting your website stats. When search engines find duplicate content, they prefer the highest ranked publisher and ignore the other sites. That means you’ll get the benefit of exactly one inbound link IF anyone publishes your article.
The likelihood of an article from an article directory being published anywhere by anyone is small. Over the years, article directories have become dumping grounds for low-quality web content. Five years ago, search engines were not penalizing duplicate content, and they were rewarding inbound links. They also tolerated much heavier keyword use. That’s why article directories initially became a popular link-building tool. Today, search engines have all come to despise (and penalize) duplicate content and keyword stuffing, so each time search engines tweak their ranking algorithms, the likelihood grows that older content will hurt your search engine rankings.
Strictly from a management perspective, you have much more control over blog posts that appear on your own site than you do over articles in an article directory, and wherever else they may end up. If you need to modify your blog content for SEO reasons, you can do so immediately. When trying to retract or update article content that you no longer control, good luck.
If you would like more information about business blogging, or you would like to work with a freelance writer to create quality content for your blog, please contact me at eileen@juliesocean.com or call me at (734) 961-0408.
Photo Credit: Jean Scheijen, via FreeImages.com