Marketing Lessons from Donald Trump's Failed Blog - The Digital Prosperity Podcast - Season 5, Episode 5

Firstly, you may be wondering, what does the title of this podcast mean?

Well, this podcast is 100% a marketing discussion and we are not here to speak about the relative merits, or otherwise Mr. Donald Trump. This week, our Managing Director, David Roberts, and our Director Will Williamson speak about the significance of having a blog page on your website, whilst referring to a unique example of Donald Trump’s failed attempt at reaching success through his own blogging platform.

As some of you may remember, on January 6^th 2021, there was an attack on the Capitol building, in the United States, following the 2020 presidential election. Shortly after the incident, Donald Trump was removed from all his social media platforms, as a result of breaching social media guidelines. This resulted in the former president creating a blog page in the hopes of recreating his large social media following and achieving publicity in traditional media. However, due to a lack of targeted content within the blog content, this meant the blog page was not achieving its desired publicity, leading it to being taken down shortly after it was set up.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

Although Donald Trump’s digital footprint cannot be compared to small to medium-sized businesses, the Trump example that David and Will discuss in this podcast is very useful for companies to be mindful of. Despite the large status and following count that Donald Trump had, without the key components which make blogs successful, even a public figure known so well in society, like himself, could not optimise their blog page. This strong example shows us businesses the important things to look out for when creating blogs on our websites.

Blogs are a significant tool to increase traffic or conversion rate on your website, and we are here to tell you how to make that happen. Many small to medium-sized businesses set up blogs on their site, as a part of their website build and start-up process, to find that shortly afterward the blog is neglected and content is not updated since setting up the website. Equally, there are many small to medium-sized businesses that do frequently update their blog articles and are constantly updating blog content week by week, but still see no real results from the content that is being produced. In this week's Digital Prosperity podcast, Dave and Will explore what makes a victorious blog and how without the fundamental ‘ingredients’ for success, a blog can fail and can generate limited traffic to your website.

What Makes an Effective Blog For A Small Business?

A blog gives you a platform to build an audience, to be useful or helpful to your audience, and to interest new or current customers to your business. As business owners, the lesson to learn from the Trump example is that blog articles must be targeted and you must be really clear on who your audience is, to make sure the content matches the people you are trying to reach. Otherwise, the blog post will fail and not generate desired results.

In the Youtube video, Dave and Will explored 4 key components that businesses should incorporate into their blog planning, and below we will go into them in further detail.

So, what are these 4 main determinants for success?

• Targeted marketing
• Keyword strategy
• Conversion strategy
• Traffic strategy

So, How Can Targeted Marketing Help My Blog?

Targeted marketing is essential for marketing success, and it is a part of the overall holistic marketing strategy, as it tells businesses who they need to target. Creating a clear Buyer Persona allows brands to better understand their ‘’typical’ or ‘ideal’ customers and how to make themselves stand out from the crowd. Starting by defining who is a good fit for your blog content, allows your business to speak directly to their desired demographic and convert high-quality leads.

How Will a Keyword Strategy Create Traffic Opportunities?

According to Will, Keyword research involves “researching what your potential customers type into Google”. This is particularly useful as Google accounts for around 97% of searches online. Therefore, as a business, it is definitely in your best interest to know what your customer is asking Google, in order to know what questions need answering within your blog content.

Clearly defining the long-tail keywords that people are searching for and using these terms within the blog content provides a solution for Google searchers and creates traffic opportunities for your website.

What Does Conversion Strategy Mean?

A conversion strategy is defined as tactics an organisation develops to ensure existing traffic or ‘website browsers’ are optimising key elements of the website and ultimately creating leads. Conversion strategies work to increase the conversion rate, which is the percentage of online ‘browsers’ who have completed the desired action on your website, social media sites, or any other digital platforms.

What Will a Traffic Strategy Do For My Website Traffic?

Knowing how you are going to get your blog page or website on the forefront of your target audiences’ and potential prospects' minds is key when planning blog content. Having a traffic strategy for blog articles on your website, opens opportunities to attract more customers to the site as you can generate ways to share the content onto external platforms such as social media, email, optimising it for google and advertising it in other areas. Therefore, the more sharing you do, the larger the potential traffic to your website becomes.

Final Thoughts

As mentioned, this week’s podcast was mainly a marketing discussion, to show businesses why it is worth considering how they implement their overall digital marketing strategy. The lessons learned from Donald Trump’s failed blog attempt remind us that marketing requires perseverance and significant planning, for it to attract the right customers. Without targeted marketing, blogs will fail to reach the right people and efforts will go to waste.

For more marketing advice, get in touch today via phone at 01332 982256, or by email at info@jdrgroup.co.uk.

Image Source: Pixabay