 |
| Image courtesy of toddbacile.wordpress.com |
We’ve been running this blog for a few years now and we think it makes a significant impact for our customers as well as our business.
We use our blog to promote our customers’ sales, as well as highlight some of their accomplishments. We also like to share about some of the exciting things happening within our company, such as new hires, new divisions and new services we can supply. Additionally, we use it to interact with our target audience (those involved in the livestock industry) by covering events and programs that might be useful, such as junior livestock shows.
That’s how we at FMG use a blog, but I bet you’re wondering how a blog can benefit your livestock operation. Here’s four solid reasons.
1. Get more traffic to your website. According to this article by Stephanie Chandler in Forbes “Blog or Go Bust: Why Your Small Business Needs a Blog,” a blog can help optimize your farm or ranch on search engines like Google.
Chander says, “Google likes blogs because content is updated frequently. While there are millions of websites that remain unchanged each day, blogs offer up fresh new information?and Google recognizes that by giving that content higher placement when users search for related topics.”
 |
| image courtesy of Google |
2. Establish yourself as a leader in your field. By writing about important issues in your field of expertise, you become an expert that people seek out for advice. In this article “Why your Business Needs a Blog … Now,” by Ellen Stuart on Vital., she shares similar reasons to blog for your business.
Stuart says, “Put yourself in a consumer?s shoes: whatever kind of product or service you?re looking for, you want to work with the most experienced and knowledgeable people, right? That?s how you want potential customers to see you when they visit your blog.”
If you are blogging about the livestock industry, you can blog about what you’re doing to prepare your animals. Here’s a few examples of posts:
- Share little “tidbits” of info about how you get the calves looking so good before your fall sale
- Talk about your breeding decisions and why you will be using so-and-so AI sire on your cows
- Use your success as an example. Why should others buy their livestock from you?
3. Create content for all of your social media outlets. Once you write your blogs, create videos or share photos — you can share the link to your blog with all of your followers on social media. This content will give some value to your business and help with number two above. When people like and share your posts, your website will get more clicks and view too! Really it’s a win-win.
Chandler says in the Forbes article, “Blogging should also be at the heart of your social media strategy. Each time you publish a new post, share the title and a link to the post with your social networks. This drives traffic back to your site and creates a snowball effect as readers then share your content with their social networks. As you share more content on a regular basis, you will inevitably watch your website traffic numbers increase as a result.”
 |
| image courtesy of socialmediaexaminer.com |
4. It’s free. Platforms such as Blogger and WordPress are free to anyone wanting to create a blog. There is some costs involved if you choose to have your own domain name. [More on this topic here.] But, if you’re going to link your blog to your website (an already existing domain) you won’t need it.
I’m sure you’re all thinking it — BLOGGING TAKES TIME. Yes it does. You might even be saying, I HAVE NOTHING TO TALK ABOUT. You don’t have nothing to say when someone comes to visit your farm or ranch, right? You talk about the cattle, you visit about your operation and talk about industry happenings. These conversations are important to have in person and online, and a blog is the perfect place to do so.
We understand that you’re busy. So why not hire FMG to be your blogger? Our social media management team can create blogs for your farm or ranch easily. It’s called ghost writing. For more information about this and our other social media management outlets, contact Robin at robin@gotfocus.co or 219.306.0323.