Starting a Blog for your Direct Sales Business

About 6 years ago, I got the grand idea that I should start a blog.

Like…the chic who knew nothing about blogging, or what platform to use, or cost, or anything really. I just knew I wanted to do it. So I spent an entire weekend learning how.

Was it easy? Not really. Was it worth it? Yep. One of the best things I ever did for my business. Most good things aren’t easy though, right?

So now I blog a couple of times a week, and in fact, I have THREE blogs. So I want to show you how it can help your business.

What is a blog?

A blog is simply an extension of your voice. It’s writing about what you are passionate about. It’s teaching others, sharing with others, and engaging with your audience.

How much does it cost?

It’s totally free. I highly recommend WordPress.com. It was very easy to choose a theme and start plugging away. Any time I had questions or couldn’t figure something out, I Googled or watched YouTube videos.

What can a blog do for your business?

Well, I have one for my Direct Sales business:

https://melissafietsamblog.wordpress.com/

I have one for our team…and then the one you’re reading this on right now:)

The one for my business serves a ton of purposes:

Landing Page: I can create a well scripted post with links, videos, and graphics and then guide my customers to a professional looking page in order to view the information they are requesting. Want to know more about the opportunity? Great! I have a link for that. That’s a landing page.

Searchable Content: By creating all this on a blog, it’s now searchable content. So you’re actually getting 3 times the punch, out of everything you do. It’s working smarter, not harder.

Shareable Content: Talk about working smarter…I can share my blog in one easy click to Twitter, Linkedin, Pinterest, Facebook, literally anywhere. So people ask me all the time how I do EVERYTHING. Well, I really just work smarter. I make one post and share in multiple ways on multiple platforms. That is what Cinchshare and WordPress can help you do. My two favorite platforms!

Tell a Story: You can tell a story that resonates with people, but isn’t “in your face selling”. And it leads them to your page and your information. THIS is where you build an audience and engagement. By being REAL. Here’s an example:

https://melissafietsamblog.wordpress.com/2017/05/01/message-to-my-sons-preschool-teacher/

Help People: This is a place where you can give valuable information about your industry. For example, my personal business is organizational products and bags. So I’ll be posting more about Organizational Tips and home hacks. NOTHING to do with my business, per say, but giving valuable information to my customers and potential customers. Because when I share those posts all over social media channels…it leads them right back to my blog full of business information.

Customer Group: This is a great thing to keep you consistently posting in your customer group. Make it a goal to write one blog post a week and share that into your customer group. That’s my new goal. To be a VALUE and a SERVICE to my customers without selling to them.

Time Management: I love that I can post something once, and I always know where to find it. My blog is a brain dump for me. Instead of doing things in a messy and non-consistent way, I make one organized post that takes me about 10 minutes longer. And now, I have it FOREVER. Literally. I can search and share with my team, my customers, whatever I want…whenever I want. So it saves me TIME.

What do you need to know about blogging?

Here’s some quick fire tips you need to know.

• Go to WordPress.com and just play around. Start it, create some graphics and banners, just JUMP. And keep at it for 3 months. The more you do it, the easier it is. And now that my page is set up, it’s as simple as writing and clicking publish. That’s it.

 

• Share to ALL your social media channels. Create original graphics for each post and share them to your Facebook business pages, your customer groups, Twitter, Pinterest, everywhere!

 

• NEVER take someone’s content or graphics. By law, anything I write on my blog is my personal property. So if you take someone’s “words” you’re actually committing a crime. A blog is to be ORIGINAL, not a copy. Make it personal and you will see the magic happen when people resonate with YOU and your words.

 

• Never take graphics from Google and put them on your blog. Same thing, you don’t have rights to those graphics and you can get in trouble for it. Use sites like Pixabay.com for graphics and then edit them with your branding in Canva.com.

 

• Make sure your title of your blog is NOT your company. You are not your company, you are an individual. So get creative or simply use your name!

 

• Make sure your blog post titles have tons of keywords in them. That is how people will find your content in searches.

 

• Schedule your posts (so easy to do in WordPress). I would say posting twice a week is good. Once is totally fine. But make a goal and stick to it. And then take that published post and schedule it out to all your other social media channels via Cinchshare (you can schedule the link to your blog).

 

• Keep it short and sweet! A blog post should be 300 words minimum in order to be indexed by Google. If you write TOO much, people will lose interest. And there’s actually research that shows that shorter blog posts get shared more! People’s attention spans are like squirrels anymore! So…I was gonna write 10 tips, but we’ll stop at 8! HAHA!

Love you guys! Happy blogging!!

Melissa Fietsam