WordPress started out as a simple blogging platform. It was simple to use and attracted individuals who wanted to publish their thoughts on the Internet. As the platform grew in popularity, it began to point out its value for SEO, search engine optimization. It seems that the search engines valued the regularly updated streams of content. In other words, new content can get bumps in search engine results.
WordPress Business Website Growth
Businesses began to notice and use WordPress for marketing. WordPress began to evolve into a platform that could look and work like other business websites while still offering a blogging platform for regular new content. According to Kinsta.com WordPress Market Share Statistics, about 43% of all websites are now on WordPress software.
This huge number of websites testifies to the value and power of WordPress. Many of these sites are not using the blogging function. Instead, they use the CMS, content management system, function of WordPress. You, as a visitor, will likely not be able to tell the difference, as WordPress websites have the pages you’re used to finding on all websites, navigation menus, and other common features.
A great many of those sites do not use the blogging function. They create static web pages and update them as needed, but there is no content creation plan with regular blog posts. Keep in mind that blog post pages can look exactly like other pages on the site. They do have some characteristics that make them different, most of them in the code of the page. Most visitors that arrive from a search engine results page do not know the difference. The value to your site is in the ability to create blog posts, schedule when they are published, and benefit from the search engines’ love of frequent and recent content.
Can Your Business Benefit from a Blog as a Part of Your Website?
While any business can benefit from using the blogging function of their WordPress site, some can reap far greater rewards. Businesses that benefit the most have changing products or services, especially those that are in industries with constant changes or evolution of products or services. There are always new developments or evolutions of products or services. The examples are many, but a few include:
• Freelancers – It really doesn’t matter if you are a computer programmer, database designer, website designer, writer, consultant, or another type of freelancer. You can set up your WordPress site with static information pages that showcase what you do. For your future site success, a blog can make a huge difference in traffic. You are constantly taking on projects, from designing a website for a manufacturer to writing content for a retail business. Your blog becomes your diary of sorts, explaining your interesting projects (no client names). You will have something about each project that illustrates your value, and the blog lets you constantly update your site visitors.
• Retail Business – A toy store has many opportunities when adding a new toy to the inventory. They can blog about each new toy or toymaker as they take them on and explain why they were chosen and introduce them to prospective customers. It can’t hurt to check the websites of your suppliers to see what they are saying about their products, from safety to quality aspects. Write your own blog post and link to their site as a source.
• Manufacturer or Crafter – While there is a huge difference in the size of business between a manufacturer and a crafter, they both sell things they make. The static pages should contain the product descriptions, and there can be pages that explain the materials and processes that go into the final product. As time goes by, new and better materials are used, and there are changes in the way products are produced or crafted. Customer testimonials or interesting uses of the products make for great blog posts as well.
Those are some examples, and there are many more. A business blog can be invaluable to a business for growing website traffic and business.
The FAQ Conversion Strategy
Does your website have a frequently asked questions page? Are there a lot of questions asked of you in the course of doing business? FAQ pages are OK, but they are usually just a list of questions in no particular order, possibly broken up into categories. This layout works, but it could be much better. It can be more friendly for the visitor and quite helpful with SEO.
Take each question and any new ones you can come up with, and turn each into a blog post of its own. The title should be the question, written in the way someone would search for it or ask it in person. Many people now do voice searches on their smartphones. Write detailed answers, longer for blog posts than those you may have on the FAQ page. Each post becomes its own standalone content item that search engines can find. As one on a page of many, it is far less visible to the engines.
Don’t worry about customers finding them, as you will have a WordPress Category of “Frequently Asked Questions.” It can be an item in your navigation bar just like before. If clicked, all the questions will still come up on a category display page. With a WordPress search bar on the sidebar, they can easily search the questions for the answers they seek.
Conclusion
Using the blog function of the WordPress software can be of value to a business website. There is value for the site visitor in finding useful and timely information. There is SEO value in that the search engines also consider timely and regular new content as a plus for a website. Check it out for your business website.