Using Blogs to Build Websites
Not too long ago I wrote my opinion about Blogs vs. Websites in a post. My opinion hasn’t changed on this topic very much (I still think blogs are the way to go) but if you already have a website set up (in Flash or html) here is a way that you can snag the benefits of both your static site and a dynamic blog.
What I failed to mention about blogs was that blogs and specifically ‘posts’ on blogs don’t stick with Google and the other search engines as much as html pages. What this means is that the search engines expect blogs to be updated often so they add more value to recency. A post that ranks well very quickly after being added may not continue to rank over time. All things being equal an html page will last longer in search engine rankings.
The downside of html pages is that you can’t leverage the automated web 2.0 resources like you can with blogs. Specifically, you can’t ‘ping’ Technorati and the other blog-specific search engines and tagging sites with html pages. By pinging I just mean putting up a flag and saying to all these resources, “Hey, I just added something to my blog. Come and check it out.” This is the way that blogs can get ranked so much more quickly.
OK, all that behind us, what does this have to do with your business? Well, if you already have a website, let’s say a typical company website where you talk about your business, your products and how stupid your visitors would have to be to buy from anyone else. Usually these types of sites consist of 8-12 pages and have very few in-bound links. Hence, they have very little chance of getting free traffic through the search engines.
Don’t worry if this describes your current situation ’cause we’re going to add a solution to fix your site’s visibility problem. You can create a seperate blog (WordPress if at all possible) and link your blog to your company website. One cool thing about a blog is that it can be very informal. This allows you to talk about various topics and not those specifically related to your business and it allows you to let your personality show through much more than possible with a stagnant site or a company brochure.
And the more content you add the more visitors you get regardless of what you’re talking about (provided you are pinging properly) and the more search engine love your blog will receive. For example, when I post on this site I know that approximately 80 visitors will come to my site specifically to read the new post. Not bad, considering I haven’t even bothered to set up an RSS feed to notify my loyal readers that I’ve added new content.
Speaking of RSS feeds, here is something that you may find fascinating about blogs. Some of you may be thinking, “Man, more writing? I don’t have anything to say as it is. What am I going to add to this blog thing?”
Believe it or not you can automatically add content to your blog using RSS feeds. It is very simple to do and very effective. You just go to Google news and find a news feed that you like and preferably relates to the topic of your blog. Then arrange your site to show the latest post from that feed on your blog automatically and your blog will be updated without you being involved whatsoever. Cool, eh?
The downside is that this won’t be original content so you don’t actually get credit for those posts from Google. However, it really doesn’t matter. I set up a blog about 3 months ago for the sole purpose of feeding a lead capture page for an online school. I set up my page, added an automatic RSS feed and forgot about it. Literally, I did nothing else with it.
I checked that site just out of curiosity and it is currently getting about 1500 visitors per month. Wow! So obviously this works. It certainly isn’t the prettiest site because I never even bothered to format the feeds but it is still bringing in traffic and that is the main thing.
Now the key is to have your blog ‘feed’ your main site. Every post should link back to your company website or lead capture page. This is why we often call such blogs ‘feeder sites’.
If you’re struggling with traffic this may be a solution to your problem. WordPress blogs are free to set up and easy to update – effortless if you set up an automated RSS feed as described above. Good luck.
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