Everyone says you should have a blog on your online store but what type of blog posts should you actually create?
This is a very common question online store owners ask and we decided to answer it by creating list a blog post ideas that can work for ecommerce websites, which will hopefully get you more traffic and more importantly, more sales! So let’s get started…
1. In-Depth Guides
One of the best types of blog posts that an ecommerce website can produce is are In-Depth Guides, where you cover everything about a certain subject and these are great for:
- Showing your knowledge and experience About your chosen niche
- Generate sales as you can link back to products that you stock
- Generating backlinks
When you are creating an in-depth guide, you want to give as much information as you can but also remember that you are more than likely going to be targeting beginners, so keep it beginner friendly and don’t go too heavy on niche-specific terminology.
These also make great pillar posts for content clusters as you can easily link to and link back from related posts.
2. Tutorials
The words Guides and Tutorials can often be interchanged but we like to think of them as:
- Guides – covers a broader subject in depth
- Tutorials – shows you how to do a specific thing
For example, you might produce an in-depth guide on How to Learn to Play the Guitar but you would produce a tutorial on How to Change Guitar Strings.
Tutorials can be a great way to build up a content cluster around a pillar post as you can answer very specific search queries in tutorials, that you wouldn’t want to in your main guide and as these are related to each other, it makes interlinking between the two very easy.
3. Informative Comparisons
Informative comparisons are a great type of post and one that many people are actively searching for, especially when they are just getting started with a hobby, profession or project and a couple of examples of these types of posts are:
- What is the difference between Knitting and Crochet?
- Impact Driver vs Hammer Drill, what is the difference?
People searching these types of questions aren’t yet at the point of buying as they trying to find out what type of product they are buying, so they in more of a research mindset but posting the odd link to examples of each product wouldn’t hurt (just don’t be spammy).
But by creating a comprehensive comparison between the two types of products, you are educating the reader and in their eyes, you are an authority on the subject.
These can also fit very nicely into a content cluster and if you do a really good job, you may get yourself a backlink or two!
4. Gear/Equipment Lists
When people are just getting started with a hobby or profession, they have little to no idea what kind of gear or equipment they should be buying.
For example, if someone is just getting started with woodwork, they probably won’t know what types of tools or equipment they are going to get started with and writing a ‘Woodworking Tool List for Beginners’, will help them get started.
From an ecommerce perspective, you can add links to relevant products that you sell or even produce your own beginner’s bundle to help them get started.
5. Buyers Guides
Buyers guides can attract visitors who are at the very start of the buying process, they have an idea what they want but have no idea what they need to be looking for.
And you have the opportunity to educate them on the subject and in these types of posts, you want to include as much relevant information as you can as you really want it to be the best resource on the internet about your chosen subject.
Within these types of post, you also want to include lots of information such as facts, figures and statistics, especially if you can post this information from original research as it is data-packed posts such as this that can generate backlinks.
These types of posts can also potentially generate sales due to the trust factor that posts of this type can generate and when they are ready to buy, they may come straight back to your site to make the purchase.
6. Gift Guides
Not everyone you are selling to is going to be the end user of the product, some of your potential customers will be looking to buy gifts for friends or family and you can create posts such as:
- Christmas gifts
- Birthday present ideas
These can be great for generating sales because people outside of these hobbies or niches aren’t really going to know what they are looking for, so you can provide a list of items that are great gift ideas.
7. Product Comparison Posts
There are many times when someone is doing research that they will get to the point where they have narrowed it down to 2 or 3 products but can’t decide which one to go for and this is where product comparison posts are great!
As you simply compare all the important aspects of the two products before coming to a conclusion but make sure that your are honest and unbiased, give the pros and cons of both products give a clear conclusion, such as:
- Product A is better than Product B
- Product A is better in this situation and Product B is better in another situation
This gives the reader an answer and helps with their buying decision as just saying both products are good doesn’t help anyone.
8. Best of Lists
Best of lists can be a great sales generator but they have to be done correctly as the people searching for these lists know what type of product they need to buy, they just want to buy the right one.
This is why you want to provide information about all the products and also provide pros and cons of each (because there is rarely a perfect product), this makes your list more credible as it shows that you know what you are talking about and you should have tried all of the products yourself.
You can also add tags to certain products in the list as there are going to be different people with different budgets and requirements looking at the list and you could include things like:
- Best overall
- Best budget option
- Best value for money
- Best for beginners
- Easiest to use
- Best feature (if it excels at one thing)
And by having links to all of the products that make the list, you will probably generate a few sales.
You could also include reviews from existing buyers to add social proof to the list.
9. Original Research
Creating a post that contains original research isn’t necessarily for readers but instead, it is a linkbait post for other bloggers as they love linking to posts that include stats based on original research as it can help give their own posts credibility and this can be a great opportunity.
But obviously, you need to find something to research and then actually conduct said research, which can be tricky but there are some things you can do, such as:
- Run Social Media polls
- Run a survey, this could be your customers or people on social media, members of groups etc
- Analyze your own data (if you have a good sample size)
- Partner with companies to do any of the above (give you access to a larger audience or amount of data)
Once you have the data, create a post outlining your findings and use lots of things like percentages and fractions as they are easy for other bloggers to include in their posts.
10. Roundup Posts
There are many different types of roundup posts that you can create for your online store, these could be:
- Expert roundup – get experts in your niche to comment on a particular subject
- Event roundup – create a post listing all the important events this month/year for your niche
- Post roundup – create a list of great posts by other creators
These might seem counter-intuitive to some as might be sending people away from your site but one thing that roundup posts can do is generate backlinks as letting the people or websites that you included in your post know when the post is live can result in them:
- Sharing your post on their social media
- Linking to that post from their website
This can also lead to potential relationships with other bloggers or business owners that can be much more fruitful further down the line.
11. Interviews
Every niche has its own micro celebs or influencers and if you can get an interview with these people and keep it relevant to your niche, it can lead to a great blog post.
Not only can this be very interesting to your audience but it can help boost your business’s profile as the person you interviewed is likely to share it on their social media and the bigger their following, the more exposure your business gets.
As with the roundup posts, this can be the start of a potentially profitable relationship between your business and theirs.
12. Guest Posts
Something many online stores don’t consider when it comes to their blog is to open it up to guest posts and if you keep this to people who are relevant to your niche, such as experts, micro-celebs and influencers you can not only get a unique, high-quality post from a recognized personality in your niche but they will also help to promote the post.
In return, you let them link back to their own website, this may be their homepage or a relevant post that they have on their site and this results in a win-win situation for both parties.
Conclusion
There are many different types of blog post that you can create for your online store and if you adopt a bloggers approach to this by creating a mix of different post types, it will allow you to generate:
- Traffic
- Sales
- Backlinks
You will probably find that your blog is much more successful and each post should be achieving at least one of these goals.
So now that you know the different types of blog post you can create, it is time to start writing some posts for your store!
Hi, I'm Paul, the Owner and Founder of EcommerceGold.
I ran my own Ecommerce Business for over 7 years and now help others start their own online retail empires!