If You Are A Coach: The 21 Ways A Blog Can Make Your Business Stronger

I personally believe that everyone needs a blog…it just makes sense from an SEO perspective to have great content filled with rich keywords.

But, as  Professional Certified Coach and a member of the coaching industry, I believe that coaches have so much to offer and share with others, and a blog is a perfect mechanism for getting your message out and delivering ongoing value.  At the end of the day, delivering a great message and adding value can make your business so much stronger.

So, if you are a coach, here are the 21 ways a blog can make your business stronger.  Of course, these apply to anyone, but today, I am truly speaking to coaches:

1) A blog can serve as a storage site for the many articles you write.  This can greatly enhance your expertise and build credibility.

2) With a great podcasting player, you can load ALL of your teleclasses straight into your blog.  You can password protect your pages for teleclasses you sell and give the others away as freebies.

3) With Survey Gizmo, you can run free surveys and assessments on your blog.

4) With a blog, you can answer the most frequently asked questions about coaching.

5) Each time you are mentioned in the media, this information can be posted on your blog.

6) I have nothing against static websites, but unless you know Dreamweaver or Front Page, many coaches pay web designers to make tiny changes that end up costing thousands of dollars annually.  With a blog, you have complete control over making updates to your pages without hiring a webmaster to do it.  If you can type, you can write a blog post or create a blog page.

7) Many of the new blog templates (check out http://ithemes.com or http://studiopress.com) offer templates that look JUST LIKE WEBSITES.  You can build pages, add opt in boxes, add video, podcasts and the list goes on and on.

8. You can become known as an expert in your field.  As a coach, when you become great with blogging, you can become a newsbreaker, spreading great news about the latest/greatest information in the coaching industry AND in the niche you represent.

9) News agencies and radio/television shows are more likely to pick up your story if you are consistently putting information out there (I know…it’s happened dozens of times for me.)

10) Your network will grow by leaps and bounds…and not just in the coaching industry but in multiple industries.

11) With a blog, you can post an events category, and each time a new event is coming, you can post it.

12) You can sell coaching,  products and training straight from your blog.  Yes…you can indeed add links to your blog to sell products and services.

13) Search engines love blogs, because they are so content rich.  Your search engine ranking will go up the more you blog.

14) If there is a concern circulating around your business or the coaching industry, you can address this immediately by posting on your blog.

15) You can allow your true voice to be heard.  As a coach, you have so much to say and offer, and most of this (I have found) goes unspoken.  With a blog, you can talk from the heart about your passions, goals and vision.

16) You can use your blog to post all of your newsletters.  With e-mail becoming more and more difficult to send and open, you can have a place on your blog just for your newsletters.

17) With a platform like WordPress, a blog can be basically free.  If you host the blog on your own domain, with a service like Hostgator.com, you pay about $9.00 per month to have a blog on your own domain.

18) You can use your blog to connect your message to over 30 social networks, including the 3 big guns:  Twitter, Facebook and Linked In.

19) When you grow tired of the “look” of your blog or it becomes outdated, you simply update it by installing a new theme…you don’t have to go back to the drawing board with a brand new design, paying thousands of dollars for a new website.

20) You can use your blog as a forum by encouraging comments from others.  The dialogue you create with others will enrich your life and the lives of your customers.

21) You can deliver ongoing value to the public every day of your life, and this is what coaches are so great with…delivering ongoing value!

At the end of the day, if the above 21 are happening, you WILL see your sales increase.  It just happens, because at the end of the day, people want to hire a coach who knows what he/she is talking about and who is on the bleeding edge of business and technology.

If you are a coach (or a business owner) and you do not yet have a blog, I invite you to check out the Become a Blogging Maniac Program starting August 10.

Best,

Bea