The ROI of blogging

In the 1990s, blogging was a way for people to express themselves, record their lives and create community through what was then an entirely new medium: the internet. Blogs are used today by millions of businesses of all sizes to increase traffic to their sites, build brand expertise, and grow revenue. Your company's blog ROI can have a significant impact on your business' overall success.

What does it really mean to have a blog ROI? How do you measure it? We will be:

• The current state of blogging
• Take a look at the different types and ROIs of blogs
• Learn how to calculate your blog's ROI

Let's get started!

Quick Take-Aways

• Blogs are read by more than three quarters of internet users.

• Nearly 90% of marketers agree that blogging is an integral part of their marketing strategy.

• Blog ROI is a combination of higher web traffic, more leads, conversions, established brand awareness, and authority.

• Your blog's ROI will be higher if you target blog content that aligns with the buyer journey.

• Calculating blog ROI requires you to determine how much revenue you will ultimately make from each metric you measure.

Blog: The current state of affairs

A blog that is well-written and engaging can become the foundation of a brand’s content marketing strategy. It can also drive up almost every metric necessary to measure its success. Blogs allow brands to promote and engage, showcase their brand personality, demonstrate their expertise, and much more.

There are over 600 million blogs online today. 6 million blog posts are posted daily. Over three quarters (77%) regularly read blogs, and 89% say that blogs are part their content marketing strategy. WordPress is visited by more than 20 million people every month.

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Blogs will be a key tool for brands in 2022 to stay ahead of their competitors and remain visible to their customers. A blog is a great way to reach a large audience.

But many don't! Only 54 percent of Fortune 500 companies have blogs. Some industries are far behind the top bloggers like technology and lifestyle.

Although it stumps me personally, when I tried to look at it from another perspective, I realized that maybe some companies aren't realizing the full potential of blog ROI for businesses. Blogs take time to see results. If you don't understand this, it can be easy to dismiss the idea of blogging or give up on it too soon.

We'll be discussing the types of blog ROI brands can expect and why it's worth the effort.

Different types of blog ROI for business

Traffic to websites

A higher organic traffic is a sign that your blog efforts are paying off. Search engines are the foundation of 93% percent of online experiences today. People now use search engines to find answers, research topics and brands, and look for solutions. Your company will get 3x more organic traffic if you have a blog that is updated frequently (this applies to both B2B as well as B2C businesses).

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Brands who generate organic traffic through blogging have big costs-benefit benefits. Blogs drive organic traffic for longer than paid ads. This is unlike paid ads which only drive traffic for as long as you pay.

Organic visitors are more likely to find your site relevant, meaningful, authentic, and enjoyable. Visitors visit your site out of genuine interest or need and not because they clicked on a Google result page.

Organic traffic has endless scaling potential. Paid ads are limited by budget constraints. Once you have established your blog, you are free to publish as much content you like, including new topic pillars and writing for each stage of the buyer's journey. You can also target new segments of customers whenever you feel it is appropriate.

Conversions, leads, and sales

It is not enough to drive traffic to your site. It is not enough to drive traffic to your website. You must first decide what your visitors should do when they arrive at your site. Then, you need to implement strategies to make them take action. You have one primary tool to accomplish this: your blog.

Begin by considering the buyer journey when you are creating topics, ideas, or a content plan. The buyer journey can be viewed from a high-level perspective as follows:

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Brands can target blog content at specific stages of the buyer's journey to reach customer segments. Users are more likely to move on if they see content that is relevant to their current stage of the buyer journey. If someone is in the awareness stage and sees a blog that offers case studies, but asks them to buy something, it's likely they won't. They were not ready to hear from customers who had already experienced the solution.

Instead, they might find a blog that addresses their problem and then ask for an email address to receive a lead magnet with useful tips.

However, this doesn't necessarily mean they won't make a purchase. They aren't yet ready. You're building brand trust by helping them to understand the problem and then letting them solve it themselves.

What does this all have to do the blog ROI? This type of targeted blog strategy can help you increase leads, conversions and sales, which are the three most important metrics for revenue growth. Hubspot research shows that brands that have blogs generate 67% more leads compared to those who don't. Without a well-planned, targeted blog strategy, you run the risk of driving organic traffic without any tangible business results.

Brand Awareness

Blogs are a favorite of many people. More than three quarters of internet users regularly read them. Most of the search results on Google and other search engines are blog articles. Sometimes people don't realize they're actually reading blogs. Blogs play an important role in building brand awareness, which is basically how people remember and recognize your brand.

HubSpot is an excellent example. HubSpot's blog is read by many salespeople and marketers, regardless of whether they are looking to purchase. HubSpot has built a huge brand recognition in this area by publishing valuable, consistent blog resources on marketing and sales topics. HubSpot is the company that companies think of when they need solutions.

Authority in branding

Brand authority is a key contributor to blog ROI. Customers, colleagues, and search engines all consider brand authority to be important. The latter uses it to rank you on the results pages. There are several ways to build brand authority through your blog.

Your brand's ability to cover topics relevant to your audience and demonstrate your knowledge and expertise shows that you can trust your brand to deliver solutions that work. This helps build trust in your brand, which is an important factor in B2B and C consumers' purchasing decisions.

Backlinks are when companies link to your blog on their websites. This establishes your brand authority. This establishes credibility.

You can be trusted by other companies in your industry for the information you provide. While backlinks can be difficult to earn, there are steps you can focus on that will help. Ahrefs has a video about it.

Calculating your blog ROI

Let's now discuss how to calculate blog ROI. There are two main steps to this process:

Calculate the cost of resources that you allocate to your blog. This includes:

• Salaries for bloggers who manage, design, or write your blog.
• Tools such as SEO software or your CMS platform
• Other employees, such as freelance writers and designers, have higher costs

Add up the ROI from your efforts. These could include:

• Traffic to your site
• Generated leads
• Subscribers to the newsletter
• Actual sales
• Social media shares

To uncover true blog ROI, you need to determine how these metrics contribute to earned revenue. Some cases are easier than others. If you generate 100 leads and 30% convert to paying customers, and each customer you earn $100, your blog's ROI from leads would look something like this:

(3000 in earned revenue per 100 leads x.30 = $100)

You may not be able to do the calculation in a straightforward way. However, you can use Google Analytics, your CMS platform’s analytics dashboard, or other data tracking strategies, to see how your blog is performing and determine its bigger impact on your business.

Great content can increase your blog's ROI

It is time-consuming to publish consistent, high quality blog posts. Blogging is a time-consuming task if you run a business. Marketing Insider Group's SEO and writer team can provide optimized content that is ready to publish every week for a year or more.

To learn more, visit our SEO blog writing service or to schedule a consultation with me to get going!