Let me guess: you’re planning your marketing strategy for the new year, and you’re asking yourself “should I bother blogging in 2024?”

Or maybe you’re considering which elements of your content marketing are working for you, and you’re contemplating whether or not blogging is worth it.

Orrrr maybe you’ve never written a blog post in your life, and you’re thinking this year would be a good time to start, but you want to make sure it actually has a good ROI.

The SEO benefits of blogging are unmatched.

• Killer for keywords
• Increases visibility
• Link-building opportunities
• Potential for social sharing
• Custom titles and descriptions
• User engagement
• Mobile-friendliness
• More pages for search engines to crawl & index
• Potential to improve local SEO
• Gives you an insight into what your audience wants via analytics

…need I go on? Yes? Okay, say less. Here I go.

First things first: before you ask “isn’t blogging, like, canceled? Or for influencers and Pinterest recipe moms only?”

No, it isn’t.

I know that some people still have an idea of what ~a blogger~ should be, because they’re stuck in 2012. Please, allow me to invite you to present day, where blogging isn’t solely about recipes and fashion, but about strategy, SEO, and sales.

Blogging is one of the most effective organic marketing tools you have at your disposal, and it’s SO MUCH EASIER than you think.

By creating fresh, keyword-rich content and leveraging the power of internal and external linking, you can drive more targeted traffic to your site and improve its overall authority and credibility.

Additionally, by optimizing your titles and descriptions, improving the user experience, and creating mobile-friendly content, you can further boost the SEO of your site and achieve better results in search engine rankings.

I know that^ was a bunch of SEO mumbo-jumbo, so I’m gonna bring it back down to Earth real quick:

You post a blog. Google says “oh, cool, new content.” Google’s spiders read it, notice all of the keywords you were able to effortlessly integrate into the post, thanks to the relevant topic & the ease of answering your community’s FAQs about your industry, and they decide to recommend your post to the right people, using the lil context clues you gave.

The right people then read your posts, fall in love with you, and pay you a million dollars.

(Or something like that.)

Second things second: what makes a good blog post, anyway?

👉🏼 Answers your readers’ questions. Because, most of the time, that’s the reason they clicked on your post in the first place: to have their question answered.

👉🏼 Easy-to-read content. Or, rather, easy-to-skim, because, let’s be real: not everyone is going to read every single word, and you still want your post to be valuable.

👉🏼 Engaging content. On the flip, though, you’ll still want to ensure your content is engaging, because, who knows? Maybe you’ll be able to convert a skimmer into a scours-every-word-er.

👉🏼 Relevant, helpful information. You don’t want your readers to get to the bottom of your blog and feel like they gained nothing. Make sure you’re including relevant, helpful information in every post. (Or at least a good story that’ll keep them entertained & happy they stuck around to read!)

Now, let’s talk about 3 reasons why I’m bullying you to start blogging.

Because, to be clear, yes: this post *is* me bullying you to start blogging. But in a nice way. I promise you’ll thank me once you hear about some of the most important positive ways it can impact your business, improve your SEO, allow you to save time on your content marketing, and potentially present new opportunities for you.

#1 – Gives you an opportunity to post fresh, relevant content

And the only thing search engines love more than fresh, relevant content is being able to recommend that content to their users. & that’s where your blogs come in.

By posting on your blog consistently, you’ll be appeasing the search engines you’re dying to show up on, by keeping your site top of mind AND active + engaging.

(Plus, duh: search engines aren’t the only ones that love new content—your audience does, too! Triple whammy bonus, providing value to your community and reaching new people and making Google and her friends happy.)

#2 – Gets your content in front of the right people

The people who don’t understand the value of blogging love to use the argument that you’d “run out of things to write about” or that “no one wants to read” what they have to say or—my personal favorite—that blogs are just for recipes, DIYs, and stay-at-home moms.

I’m about to prove them wrong.

Whether you’re a service-based business owner or a product-based business owner, blogging can absolutely work for you.

(Spoiler alert: serious MythBusters moment about to happen, because, no, your blogs don’t always have to explicitly revolve around your services or your products. In fact, they shouldn’t.)

Take this blog post I wrote about Tonic Site Shop, for example.

I wrote this post for a couple reasons:

→ It’s relevant to my audience, and it answers a common question I know they have. If you’re considering working with a website copywriter—or purchasing a copy course / downloading a DIY resource from a website copywriter—chances are you’re also considering buying a website template.

→ I knew it would be a good opportunity to reach new people who may need what I have to offer. There are no doubt tons of people searching the depths of the Internet to find out whether or not it’s worth it to spend $1000+ on a Showit website template from Tonic Site Shop.

And, it’s very likely that the people searching for more info on Tonic would also love more info about website copy—or, maybe, some people don’t even know what website copy IS yet, and, in that case, my blog post was the perfect place to introduce an essential element of their site.

→ I wanted to share my affiliate link. Tonic Site Shop has an amazing affiliate program with really awesome perks, and my unique code (“BTLCOPY”) gives my readers 15% off of anything in their shop.

Plus, like I said: it’s directly relevant to my audience, and I’d recommend their Showit website templates whether I were an affiliate or not, which made it the perfect opportunity to organically share how much I love them.

What I didn’t expect when I wrote this post, though, is that I’d rank “position zero.”

Just in case you’re unfamiliar, wondering “what the heck is position zero?”—like I was, until my SEO-obsessed friend Abbey (who, by the way, has this Tonic template with BTL-crafted website copy) enlightened me—position zero is the first Google search result that shows up above the organic listings.

And, according to Google, position zero also “aims to answer readers’ questions, without needing to click the search result link.”

You may know this coveted spot as a ‘featured snippet’ because, well, that’s what it is.

But whether you knew this element of your search result had a name or not, you’ve definitely seen it (and used it!) before, and you likely don’t ever question it.

Because you know Google wouldn’t steer you wrong, and the answer is likely credible.

To be clear: yes, this is me saying that Google gave me some serious (online) street cred when it comes to the authority on if Tonic Site Shop deserves your $$$.

Now, here’s why this is a big deal—and why it proves taking the 90 minutes (at the maximum) to write this blog post was worth it.

1. I’m the #1 go-to for answering the question of whether Tonic Site Shop is worth it.
2. If anyone wants to learn more about why Tonic Site Shop is worth it, they’ll click on my post to read.
3. My name now exists in connection with Tonic’s, and their search volume is a lot higher than mine.
4. People searching for Tonic are likely to find my site, and either a) use my affiliate code (which earns me money) or, b) spend time on my site (and likely either read another post, download a freebie, purchase something from my shop, or inquire to work with me).
5. Tonic themselves saw this post, read it, loved it, and hired me. We now work together on a consistent basis, solely thanks to this blog.

& I accomplished all of that without writing about / selling my services or my digital products at all.

See?! Consider this your proof that blogging doesn’t have to be boring, or have to be solely based on what your offerings are.

#3 – Gives you long-form content to repurpose for and promote via other marketing channels

Whenever anyone asks me whether they should prioritize email marketing or blogging first (which, randomly, happens a lot, probably because I teach a course on both), I always tell them that a] it wouldn’t be difficult to work on both at the same time because they can go together, and b] if you have to choose, pick blogging.

Here’s why:

Blog posts are usually always your longest, most researched, most effort-heavy pieces of content.

(And that’s not to say blogs take tons of time or research or manpower—don’t get discouraged—I’m simply pointing out that they usually take longer than emails or social media posts.)

So, when you spend the time to write a solid blog post, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel when it comes to your other marketing channels.

One blog post could make several captions, giving you a week’s worth of Instagram posts, or more.

Take this one, for example. I could make a…

• Grid post to let my followers know there’s a new blog post to check out
• Story with the link to read the blog post
• Carousel post with the reasons blogging isn’t dead / should be part of your marketing strategy for 2024
• Grid post about how I rank Position Zero for my Tonic blog post & why that’s cool
• Carousel post about what makes a good blog post
• Reel about the 3 reasons blogging is still relevant in 2024
• Infographic sharing my blog analytics proving how impactful blogging is

Same goes for email newsletters—I could use any of those ideas for my weekly newsletter, and then direct people to the link for this post to read the rest of the blog.

(Which, by the way, I’m 100% going to do as soon as I’m done writing this, so if you came from the Tuesday Table of Contents, hiiii!)

You could also apply these ideas to TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn… the list goes on and on.

So, yeah, I’d say blogging is still relevant to your marketing strategy in 2024.

And I hope you agree! 😉

If you found this post helpful, and you liked learning about the benefits of content writing, you’d love my weekly newsletter! I send the best story-based marketing newsletter on the Internet (so I’ve been told) and I’d to hang with you in your inbox every Tuesday morning at 6:22am sharp. Click here to subscribe!

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If we haven’t had the chance to *virtually* meet yet, hi! I’m Sara Noel—website copywriter and marketing mentor for creatives, copywriters, and all-around cool people. If you like my content and you want even more BTL in your life, here are a few ways you can connect with me:

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Sign up for my web copy course. Actually, it’s not *only* about website copywriting—I also teach modules on copywriting basics, developing your target audience, search engine optimization, blogging, and email marketing.

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To get in touch with me directly, send me a DM or email sara@betweenthelinescopy.com. Have a great day!