It has been widely cited that companies investing time and resources in order to regularly publish quality content to their blogs generate more website traffic and business leads. Tech Client found that 70% of consumers learn about a company through content rather than ads. Furthermore, it is understood that B2C companies that publish blogs generate 88% more leads per month than those that do not (Rick’s Tips).
Blogging is an investment that is proven to pay out over time; when HubSpot analysed the leads generated by their blog, they found that over 75% of their views and 90% of their leads came from old posts.
Dedicating time to include blogging in a company’s Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategy has proven to help obtain a higher-ranking placement in search engines. This has resulted in more traffic through organic searching, rather than paid. Putting out regular, quality content in blogs helps to place a company at the centre of an industry niche, demonstrating that your company is the subject matter expert. There is a 434% higher chance of being ranked highly on search engines if you feature a blog as part of your website (Tech Client). Fresh, regular content encourages the search engines to come back and re-index your site, ultimately helping increase website visitors.
New content is fundamental to SEO and gives customers a reason to keep coming back and sharing it to their wider networks (Red666marketing). Sharing links via social channels allows the content to be ‘re-enabled’. Each blog post can become 2-3 Facebook posts, 4-5 Tweets, a discussion in LinkedIn, a Pin on Pinterest and so much more. It can also be retrieved and shared weeks or months later (Red666Marketing).
Small businesses putting out blogs get 126% more lead growth than small businesses that do not, according to ‘ThinkCreative’. However, in order to effectively achieve such results it is necessary to understand the appropriate volume and schedule of blogs to publish. It is also useful to understand what scale of growth you can expect to achieve in order to set and measure targets.
HubSpot analysed their blogging data from 13,500+ customers to measure the impact on the number of blogs a company publishes monthly. They further break this data into that on website traffic and business leads, according to their company size and type (B2B or B2C).
Overall, HubSpot found that companies publishing 16-plus blog posts per month accumulated nearly 3.5 times more traffic than companies that published up to 4 posts per month.
Smaller companies (between 1-25 employees) that posted 11 or more blogs each month were found to drive far higher traffic than found in companies of the same size publishing less. Companies that published 11 or more posts per month had almost triple the traffic than others publishing only one monthly post, and nearly twice as much traffic as those publishing 2 – 5 monthly posts.
The larger companies (between 26 and 200 employees) publishing 11 or more blog posts per month had nearly twice as much traffic than those publishing only one post per month. Furthermore, data from HubSpot’s customer base found that both B2B and B2C companies increased incoming traffic to their websites the more blog posts they published.
For B2C companies, there was a fixed, positive correlation between the number of blogs put out and the amount of traffic attracted. However, results for B2B companies were slightly different; although a positive correlation exists between blogs posted and traffic received, there is a smaller difference between the volume of blogs posted. HubSpot found that traffic was only slightly higher for B2B companies publishing between 6 and 10 monthly posts as opposed to 0 – 1 monthly posts. Despite this, B2B companies blogging 11+ times per month still almost tripled traffic to their websites, compared to those blogging 0 – 1 times per month, suggesting that it is still well worth increasing blog content output in order to gain incoming traffic.
In relation to business leads, HubSpot found that where there is an increase in blog publishing, more business leads are generated. Companies that published 16 or more blog posts per month got over 4 times more leads than companies that published between zero and 4 posts.
To break this down further according to company size; the smaller companies again saw the highest returns. When companies published 11 or more blog posts, nearly twice as many leads were generated in comparison to those that published between 6 and 10.
Medium sized companies with between 26 – 200 employees generated over twice as many leads than those blogging up to 3 times each month.
Larger companies (201+ employees) generated the most leads when they published over 6 or more posts each month; those that posted 6 blogs or more each month generated around 1.75 times more leads than those posting between 0 and 5 blogs.
There was a substantial difference in lead generation for B2C companies publishing over 11 monthly blogs compared to those putting out 10 or less. Those that blogged 11+ times per month got more than 4X as many leads than those that blog only 4 – 5 times per month (HubSpot).
For B2B companies there was a continued noticeable difference in lead generation. Those that blogged over 11 times each month got just under four times as many leads as those blogging 0 – 3 times per month.
HubSpot found that the more blog posts companies published in total, the more inbound traffic found its way to the intended website. The most notable difference in results were recorded when blog posts exceeded 400 in total. Companies that had published 401+ blog posts in total attracted nearly twice as much traffic as companies that published 301 – 400 blog posts.
In relation to the generation of new business leads, companies that published 401+ total blog posts got over 3 times more leads than companies that published between 0 – 100 total blog posts (HubSpot). These findings are consistent with statistics cited from Rick’s Tips, which states that B2C companies that blog generate 88% more leads per month than those that do not.
The more blog posts a company publishes, the more overall content there will be for potential customers to find through social media and links through other websites, thereby increasing traffic and the opportunity for leads over time.
It has been found that 70% of consumers learn about a company through content rather than ads, (Tech Client), and furthermore 81% of online consumers trust information and advice from blogs (BlogHer), indicating a greater opportunity to attract consumers via blog output.
Considering the research findings from HubSpot and supporting statistics, it is clear that a commitment to publishing regular monthly blog posts would return a business with significantly increased website traffic and business generation, to improve and expand client/consumer base and best represent a businesses services and values.
If you would like to discuss ways that Mint Content can help your company increase traffic, leads and customers through blogging and other forms of content marketing, contact hello@mint-content.com today!
