3 reasons why your blog should be built as part of your website
“Should my blog be part of my website or should I set it up on Blogger or another blogging platform?”
As more and more people recognize the importance of blogging as part of their marketing strategy, I am being asked this question fairly regularly. Hands down, I recommend building your blog as part of your website.
Here’s why:
1. SEO, SEO, SEO!
This is absolutely the top reason your blog should be on your website. Google has changed its algorithms significantly over the past year and increasingly places importance on content rich sites when deciding which sites will be included in search results. A well written blog that is part of your website will establish your website (and your company) as an authority in the discerning eyes of Google. Crosslinking to other blog articles within your site builds a rich source of backlinks, also positively impacting your site in Google results. There is zero SEO benefit in hosting your blog separately from your website.
2. It provides a seamless experience for your site visitors.
Having your blog hosted on your website makes it far easier for visitors who are on your website to learn more about your company. From your blog, your visitors will be able to see you are an active industry thought leader. They will then be able to jump to other parts of your site to see samples of your work, products and services, and, most importantly, how to contact you – all without having to adjust to a completely different design, and location. By keeping them on your site, you minimize the chances of them forgetting what company it was they were admiring.
3. It is easier and cheaper to maintain a single platform.
Why would anyone choose to learn, customize, and maintain two different platforms? I don’t know about you, but I like to make my life easier. Having a single branded design that contains both my website and my blog is much easier to deal with than the logistics of maintaining two separate platforms.
To be fair there are a few reasons you might consider keeping your blog separate from your company website. If you are trying to develop an individual brand loosely tied to your main brand, or if you are trying to focus your blog on a very tightly defined niche market, there may be a benefit in maintaining some distance from your website. By and large, though, this is the exception and not the rule for the majority of small businesses and organizations.
Read more SageAdvice about how to build your blog audience
You can also check out my Prezi titled Blogging: Why and How.