Why Blogs Are Better Than Traditional Advertising

Blogging isn’t just about stay-at-home moms posting recipes, or IT geeks ranting about software updates. Thoughtfully crafted company blogs are actually a viable, modern-day form of business advertising. In fact, blogs are actually better than traditional advertising in a number of different ways.

Blogs are “Free”

Unlike traditional forms of advertising, there are no fees for posting a blog. If you already have a CMS website with a blog enabled, you have everything you need to write and publish a blog post. Of course, posting a blog post isn’t 100% free because it takes employee time to write and create content for the blog. And depending on how in-depth and creative you want to get, it can require additional resources like graphic design time or purchasing professional images. But good ad copy would require those sort of creative costs anyway, so you are still saving a substantial amount of money with a blog versus a paid advertisement.

Blogs are SEO-Friendly

Unlike online ads, blog posts can be optimized for organic search. They can include optimized keywords and content, while paid ads are usually limited to what the hosting website wants to display. The content included in blog posts are also naturally attractive for link building. Blog posts with useful, funny, or informative content are linked to by other websites and even listed as linked resources. All of those backlinks are great for SEO, and even better than ads because they are free and organic!

Blogs Drive Website Traffic

Other forms of online advertising also drive traffic to your website, but blog posts have a permanent address on your website while an ad placement is temporary. Since blog posts have a long-term url address on your website, they are around long enough (and often enough) to be crawled and indexed by search engines. A paid online advertisement might only be on the hosting website for 1 week and never indexed by Google. Having your blog post indexed by search engines like Google means the content is searchable. Someone looking for help or advice on a particular topic, like “Why are blogs better than advertising?” for example, could then see your blog posted listed in their search results. This helps increase website traffic from people who may not have otherwise thought to look for you or know they needed your services.

Blogs Provide Extended Reach

Being indexed by search engines also means that the search engines will often show your blog posts in search results alongside your other landing pages. This is great for extending your online reach. The more online real estate you can cover, the greater your circle of influence becomes. Blog posts can also give you extended reach through social media. A great blog will often be shared by a couple of your loyal fans, exposing your blog and website to their social circles – who, in-turn, share your content with their circles. The extended audience potential becomes virtually limitless. Whereas how often do you see people share paid advertisements with each other?

Tags: Digital Marketing • Search Engine Optimization