One of our top recommendations when clients ask how they can improve their website’s SEO is to have a blog on their website.

Google is looking for websites that show they have the following: experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness in a specific space. A blog allows you to produce an on-going stream of helpful, targeted content to your audience that will help strategically drive traffic to your website.

First, let’s talk results

We get it, nobody wants to spend time on marketing efforts that don’t get results. From our experience, the few hours we spend each month writing blog posts has paid off tremendously. Let me talk you through some numbers.

According to our SEM Rush report, we’ve seen an 80% increase in traffic cost from our blog page. (Traffic cost, as defined by SEM Rush, estimates how much that site's organic traffic is worth.) Additionally, when we’ve stopped consistently blogging, our traffic takes a dip. You can see in the chart below our spikes and dips, which directly correlate with how consistent we’ve been with our blog.

In conclusion, we’ve found our blog to be a valuable marketing tool and well worth the time we invest.

Let’s dive in! Here are 4 reasons why having a blog on your website will help with SEO, and tips on how to get started today.

1. Helps establish your authority and expertise

As mentioned, Google is looking for websites that demonstrate expertise and authority in a given space. For example, if you’re a small business accountant that has a blog with educational articles to help business owners do their taxes and bookkeeping, that helps communicate your authority to Google.

Here are a few tips when selecting which blog articles to write:

• Consider the commonly asked questions you get from clients or customers and use it as inspiration for a helpful blog article

• Choose an industry-specific tool, platform, or resource that would help your ideal customer and write a blog post about it. Compare it to others and offer helpful advice to your audience.

Not only can a blog help communicate your authority to Google, more importantly, it builds trust with your audience.

2. Allows you to target specific keywords

With a blog, you can target specific keywords and topics related to your industry. While this is recommended to do throughout the content of your website, a blog offers additional opportunities to rank for desired keywords, without cluttering up your main pages with more niche or specific content.

By naturally including these keywords in your blog posts, you increase the chances of showing up in search results when people look for those terms. More visibility means more organic traffic to your site!

Here’s a few tips when choosing and integrating keywords into your blog posts:

• Use answerthepublic.com to find out what users are searching for to provide inspiration for blog article topics

• Use a tool like Ubersuggest to find out a specific keywords search volume (how many people are searching for it) and difficulty (competition) to inform where to put your energy

3. Increases internal and external link opportunities

Both internal and external linking are useful strategies to help your site’s SEO. In short, internal links are links from one page on your website to another page on your website. External links (also called backlinks) are when another website links to a page on your website.

Linking to relevant pages on your site within your blog articles helps search engines understand your site's structure. Plus, it helps lead visitors through your site.

Great blog content also can attract links from other websites. These backlinks are like votes of confidence from other reputable sources, and search engines love them. By consistently creating valuable and shareable blog posts, you increase the chances of getting these awesome backlinks, which can boost your SEO.

4. Helps ensure your site’s content remains updated

Google’s goal is deliver search results that are as accurate and relevant as possible. A site that has updated, fresh content has a much better chance of showing up in search results than a website that hasn’t been touched in years.

It’s important to note that beyond just updated content, Google is looking for high-quality content. Make sure your blog posts are well-written, informative, and engaging with the ultimate goal of providing value to site visitors. Keep in mind factors like depth of information, originality, accuracy, and the use of photos or videos, which all contribute to content quality.

Pro tip: optimize well-performing blog articles

Notice a blog article that’s high in page views? Optimize those views with a relevant call to action button at the bottom or a free download.

For example, if you’re a financial advisor and your blog article about planning for retirement is performing well, create a downloadable resource that further helps visitors plan for retirement. This is also a great way to build your email list.

Lastly, well-performing blogs should be kept up-to-date. Keep an eye on outdated information or opportunities to provide more value, especially on blogs that seem to be getting more attention.

Looking for expert SEO advice?

Whitney with Delaney Consulting Co has been helping us boost our SEO for several years. She’s a great resource if you’re looking for expert advice for your site’s SEO!