By Deirdre Weedon

There is some great news for insurance agencies who have been diligently blogging every week. Blogs influence what consumers purchase. According to Technorati’s 2013 Digital Brand Report, consumers rated blogs as the third-most influential digital resource when making purchase decisions. Retail sites were in first place and brand sites came in second. Technorati also found that blogs came in fifth as the most trustworthy source of information on the internet. Impressive, but what does it tell us? It demonstrates that through blogging, agencies have a great opportunity to reach people and turn them into clients. Let’s look at some ways that will help you with this effort.

Share your posts on your social networks

Research by International Data Corp points out that smartphone users check Facebook an average of 14 times a day, so sharing your blogs there makes sense. LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+ are also excellent networks to share your posts. When sharing your posts, include a photo and a status update. Notice how in the image to the right, there is an interesting image and a status letting people know what the post is about and why they should read it? You want to include that when you share.

Use Long Tail Keywords

Use Long Tail Keywords in your blog. A Long Tail Keyword is a popularly searched phrase that is at least three words long and covers a very specific topic. For example, “long term care insurance for veterans” is an example of a long tail keyword that you could use in a blog post, particularly in your title. See Astonish’s blog post about Long Tail Keywords to learn more about them, including how to find them.

Use title tags on your posts

Title tags define a page by offering a concise and compelling title for your blog posts. The Title Tag is what will appear in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs), as the link above the meta description. The title tag also appears on social media sites when you post a link there. You want your title tag to inform people of the topic and persuade them to click over to read the article. If you can use a long tail keyword in the title naturally, it’s a bonus, since people are more likely to click on a link when it’s title matches the search query they used. Keep in mind that if your title doesn’t match what your post is about, people might leave your site quickly, and that is never a good thing. Google displays 50-60 characters of a title tag so you need to make it short. Check out this title emulator tool by Moz.com to see how your title would appear in a search.

Use meta descriptions on your posts

Just like the title tag, you want to write a meta description for each post. As shown in the image above, the meta description will show up on the SERPs below the title tag. It’s important to be clear and compelling. Using just 156 characters, the challenge is to show your reader why he or she should click over to your site. Make it conversational and not a heavy sales pitch. You want to capture their attention and give them a reason to look at what you posted. It’s a call to action. Use title tags and meta descriptions to give searchers a description of what your post is about and a reason why they should read it. Think of the words “what and why” as you write them.

There are many ways to promote your blog. The most important factor is that you are blogging regularly. However, if you’re not blogging regularly, why not start now? There is no time like the present to take your business to the next level.