In this day and age, when most people are online, blogging has pretty much become a way of life for a lot of people. Yes, it might have started as a way for people to express themselves and share their ideas with the world, but it’s now transformed into more than just an online journal. Lifestyle blogs, for instance, can still be about anything that piques the author’s interests – clothes, traveling, etc.—but these blogs can also be used as a marketing tool to sell products or services online.
Complement Your Lifestyle Blog with an eCommerce Website
Blogging to Boost Your Business’ Online Presence
One of the most effective ways to reel traffic to your business’ website is to develop an engaging and informative blog site for your target audience. For instance, an online store selling baby products can attract potential buyers by creating a blog about child-rearing. You can perhaps write about the different ways to treat diaper rashes and then include a link in your post that will take your readers to a site where they can directly buy a nappy cream you’re selling. Not only will it attract potential customers to visit your site and possibly buy your products, but you’d also be able to talk to them on your blog’s comment section and perhaps learn more about e-commerce business data and buying habits.
Aside from that, blogs can help your website rank in major search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. According to e-commerce statistics, your blog will most likely rank higher in search engines through the proper use of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategies such as keywording, backlinking, and internal linking. And, as most would know, ranking higher than your competitor in search engines would translate into more site traffic and possibly higher sales.
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In today’s ever-evolving and competitive world of e-commerce, having a website just wouldn’t cut it if you are to ensure your business’ success. That’s because nowadays, most (if not all) businesses also have websites to market their goods or services—even your competitors. And if you don’t elevate your e-commerce game, chances are, your business will probably fail.
Monetizing Your Lifestyle Blogs
But what if you’re not a business owner and are not interested in directly selling your products or services online? Yes, you can still earn through your blog site. If you are a lifestyle blogger, there are a lot of opportunities for you to still cash in from what you write about. Here are some examples of how you can monetize your lifestyle blog:
- Affiliate marketing is where you promote a company’s products and services. For example, you can earn commissions for clicks or sales the company gets when your readers click blog links. Click here to learn more about affiliate marketing.
- Sponsored content – as the name suggests, these blogs are sponsored or paid for by the company to be published on your blog. Note that this will only work if your blog site has a ton of traffic. Otherwise, companies wouldn’t even bother contacting you to sponsor content on your blog.
Blogging Tips for E-commerce
Now that you know the benefits of blogging on e-commerce, let’s talk about how you can create engaging and informative content to attract more visitors to your website. Here are some blogging tips that will help entice potential clients and ultimately turn your online shop into a financial success:
- Come up with interesting topics. It’s no secret that your topics should be engaging and interesting to attract viewers. It’s probably the most challenging blogging, as almost every topic has been covered. But don’t you worry too much about it? The trick is to make your posts more creative and interesting for your target demographics. One way of coming up with relatively fresh e-commerce blog ideas is to ask your customers directly—what they want to know more about and what topics they are more interested in. It is also necessary to follow the trends and the current news in the industry you’re in. This way, you’ll be able to create more relevant blog posts. You can also write about a specific product or brand you’re selling, highlighting the benefits of a product and why people should buy it. And lastly, when you can’t come up with a new topic, you can always write a “how to” post to provide useful info about a subject that people always appreciate.
- Grab attention with a captivating title. You can reel traffic to your blog post with an interesting title alone. However, according to studies, people tend to disengage from a blog post if the title is not interesting enough or too vague. So make sure that your titles are short (about sixty-five characters, including spaces), use interesting adjectives, and are clear enough that the readers would easily get what the article is all about just by reading the title alone.
- Make use of engaging visuals. Humans are visual beings; people tend to remain on a page if it has pictures, GIFs, videos, or infographics. Aside from these visuals, make sure that the overall e-commerce website design is pleasant to look at. That’s because even if your content is great, people would probably lose interest in your website when they see a page with just text and the design is flat and ho-hum.
- Take advantage of available tools and templates. For example, if you use WordPress, there is an e-commerce plug-in that you can install to turn your blog into an e-commerce site. Then, complement it with the right WP theme, such as Dangdoot, Multicommerce, and Storefront, to make your blog/e-store more responsive and intuitive for your site visitors.
- Promote your blog. Because how else would more people know about it, right? How would you promote your blog? You can always take advantage of the power of social media—not just sharing your blog on different social media platforms but actively engaging commenters on different social media posts. And lastly, aside from social media, you can go directly to potential customers by promoting your blog via email. Sending people emails isn’t just easy and effective; it also allows you to engage your target customers directly and build a stronger and lasting relationship.
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Blogging certainly plays a huge role in e-commerce nowadays. It’s a great marketing tool as it helps woo potential buyers into an online store—whether your own or a company that pays you to promote their products. If you are passionate about writing and enjoy blogging, why not earn money?
