How To Advertise Your New Business In Blog Posts Without Looking Too Promotional

Image via Flickr user twicepix.

This is a guest contribution from freelance writer Victor Ijidola.

Sometimes we just want to advertise our new businesses in blog posts so people can quickly know the new product or service we’re selling.

But then, we don’t want our readers to see us as being too promotional. So often we say little or nothing about our product, thereby making a lot of them read, get value, and leave. without ever having a glimpse of what we sell.

Honestly, that doesn’t sound good for business.

So how do you solve this puzzle?

Here’s the truth: Millions of people visit various blogs every day to get tips that would help solve specific problems for them. If they begin to read your posts and notice that you’re all about how to get their hard-earned cash, they mostly won’t have a reason to give you their attention.

And when when they don’t give you their attention, they’re not in the right frame of mind to buy whatever you’ve got to sell.

So you really don’t want to look too promotional in your blog posts.

In this post, I’ll be sharing two basic strategies by which you can effectively advertise your new business in blog posts without turning people off.

Strategy #1: The challenge approach

Okay, this approach will stress you. However, you will discover that it’s worth the effort in the end.

Basically, here’s how it works:

• Come up with a problem
• Solve the problem with your product/service
• Get results
• Share your results in blog posts

The following posts will give you a clearer picture of the challenge approach:

1. Neil Patel’s How I Grew Techcrunch’s Traffic By 30% In 60 Days

So what’s the problem in this case? Traffic.

It’s something anyone who makes blogging a part of his marketing strategy would crave for. But if you’re running a blog, you’d know how challenging it can be.

Neil solved this problem by using his digital marketing service to grow TechCrunch’s traffic by 30%, and then shared his result in a blog post.

See how it works?

This way, he’s not only sharing some great tips with his readers, he’s also advertising his craft.

1. Zac Johnson’s How I Made $860,538.38 PROFIT in 4 Months!

Six figures in four months?!

Seriously, that’s a big problem for a heap of us bloggers.

Zac got it solved and made a blog post out of it — telling the whole world that he really is a genius in making money online.

How does this apply to his products and services?

Well, there are a lot of bloggers out there who would do anything possible to make as much as six figures in a year, let alone in just four months.

Hence, if Zac is offering any make-money-online coaching service, trust me, people would sign up from all over the world.

But how do you get these kind of challenges and results to share as blog posts while you’re just starting out your business?

After all, these guys have being in their respective niches for years. Of course, they would have even more to share form their experiences.

Well, it’s the same approach:

• Challenge yourself with a problem – particularly one that your peers find challenging.
• Use your product/service to solve it
• Then share your results in blog posts

It doesn’t have to be multiple challenges at once.

Just pick one. After all, we all face challenges at one point or the other in our lives, and we discover that one problem is better tackled than two or more.

Here’s an example of a post by a blogger who challenged himself to write 270 guest posts around the year he started out blogging.

Bamidele Onibalusi’s How I Wrote 270 Guest Posts In 8 Months.

Bamidele started blogging in 2010 and challenged himself to write more guest posts that every other blogger in that same year.

Long story short, he was able to write 270 guest posts in 2010.

The problem here is this: getting 40 guest posts published in eight months is a huge problem for a lot of us bloggers.

Bamidele wrote 270! Seriously, that’s huge.

So what results did he get? He puts it this way

“…I got no true results until I told people what I’m capable of. It all started when I wrote a post on my blog telling people how I wrote 270 guest posts in 8 months, this boosted my credibility, made people to start respecting me, brought a lot of interview offers and eventually landed me a big client…”

See how it works?

If you’re freelance writer, for instance, you come up with a challenge like: “getting a good number of social shares on a particular article”or “getting published on a big blog”.

When you’re done with the challenge (if you succeed, of course), you can then come up with a post like: How I Got [xxx] Number of Shares on a Single Guest Post.

This would tell your prospects that, as a freelance writer, you can write articles that will get their prospects engaged and in turn, expose their brand to more customers.

See how it works? When you solve a common problem, you become recognized.

Strategy #2: The business blogging approach

If you run a regular blog, don’t worry, it won’t hurt to do some business blogging once in a while.

After all, you want to advertise your product/service blog posts without looking to promotional, right?

By the way, what exactly is business blogging?

As Corey Eridon of HubSpot puts it “Business blogging is a marketing tactic that uses blogging to get your business more online visibility.

It’s simply the art of running a blog that talks about how your product or service can solve specific problems for people.

For example, HubSpot is an inbound marketing company, hence, you’ll usually find topics related to inbound marketing on their blog. That’s business blogging.

Okay you get the drift.

So if you’re an internet marketer, for instance, you can simply write posts like:

• 7 Incredible Reasons Why Internet Marketing Is A Must For Every Business
• How Internet Marketing Can Get You Longtime Customers, etc.

Here are few tips you need to make this approach effective:

• Content is king – you’ve heard that a million times. So genuinely write great contents. We know it’s really not about word counts, but take your time to dive into every corner of each topic. This way, you would get your prospects’ attention.

• Give at least one example that drops a hint about your product or service in each post. Take a look at this excerpt from Linda Formichelli’s How to Earn $250 Per Hour As a Freelance Writer:

“I’ve just developed a handful of simple habits that have bumped my pay rate much higher than the pay rate of the average freelance writer” 

See how she dropped the hint that she’s a freelance writer?

• Lastly, craft a compelling author bio.

Bonus tip: You can use this approach on your guest posts on bigger blogs. This way, you’ll be reaching a wider audience, telling them how much you know your stuff.

I used this approach with my guest post on Blogging Tips.

The result? I got a client.

Here’s the harsh truth 

If I’m going to be honest with you, I’ll let you know that the strategies above don’t always bring an overnight success.

However, it does bring success.

But you’ve got to use them to write a heap of great posts, on your blog and on other blogs.

Danny Iny of Firepole Marketing puts it this way, “You understand that if you want blogging to part of your marketing strategy, then you’re going to have to write great posts, and lots of them – on your blog, and on bigger blogs, too” .

What are your thoughts?

Victor Ijidola is professional freelance writer and copywriter. You can learn more about his freelance writing services or more get sales and marketing tips for your new business on his website. Some of his works have also been published on Forbes and Blogging Tips. Connect with on Twitter @veeblogs