Micro-investing has become a popular option among younger audiences. This presents an opportunity for finance content marketers who wish to tap into a large, very stable reader base. This is a topic that can net you some very long-term faithful readers and followers if you present your blog in the right way.
Today, I want to offer some advice on how to set up your micro-investing blog for success. Then, I will give some ideas for topics your readers will find engaging. Finally, I want to suggest a few types of support content that will get people to read and keep reading.
Setting Up Your Blog
Your blog is the hub of all your content distribution. The vast majority of traffic that content marketers see flows through their blogs. This is true in any content area or niche. Because this is so important, it is equally important to set up your blog for success from day one. Here are a few things to consider:
Your Blogging Platform: Don’t use blog sites like BlogSpot or WordPress to present any blog you intend to monetize. Make the tiny investment in a domain and create your own directly branded website and blog. You can always upload the WordPress platform and work with it from your own site, and I highly recommend doing so. WordPress facilitates many widgets and site enhancements that can give you a clear picture of who is reading your content and what types of content get the most engagement.
Your Website Template: It is also critical that you choose a site template that is responsive. This means that it will display properly on all devices, from large-screen laptops to smartphones and everything in between. Gone are the days of having to develop separate sites for desktop and mobile. Just choose a responsive template and go from there.
Blog Formatting and Presentation: The presentation of your blog is also crucial. Keep relevant points together in short, tight paragraphs. Use section headings that draw the reader’s eye to key concepts. Research current, relevant keywords and insert them organically into the text of your post. Also, research evergreen keywords (ones that people are likely to always use to find your type of content) and include them. Don’t oversaturate with keywords, but don’t be afraid to use a few if they flow well and have relevance to the part of your posts in which you include them.
Start with at Least 5 Blog Posts
Ad providers like Google insist on a good starting base of content before they will approve a website for ads. Five posts at launch should be considered a minimum. For a blog about micro-investing, you might want to cover topics that relate to some or all of the following and gauge which subject areas get the most engagement. Over time, you may find your blog gravitating toward a single concept or small group of concepts that you have fine-tuned over time to maximize readership and conversions. Here are a few content areas to consider:
How Micro-Investing Works
Start at square one and explain to your readers what this is and how it can benefit them. Stress the idea of very small investments and allay fears about “losing it all” on a bad gamble. Use your unique understanding and knowledge to draw readers in. Make them feel comfortable with the process and, more to the point, make them feel comfortable having you as their guide.
Topics That Relate to Millennials
Millennials are among the biggest adopters of the concept of micro-investing. They have grown up in a world that has made it very difficult to accomplish their financial goals and are doing what they can to try to build a nest egg for themselves and for their families.
Their fears about the future are a good focal point for reaching them with good messaging and information about micro-investing. This is called jabbing the “pain points” and using a problem/solution format to keep readers engaged and make them feel secure that you have solutions to offer.
Micro-Investing Apps
Since so much of micro-investing is based on smartphone apps, why not offer honest reviews of some of the most popular ones, so your readers know which ones to pick? Even better, do some digging and see if any of the lesser-known apps out there might be better fits for some users and explain why.
This is a very accessible content area with loads of source material to work from. You don’t have to have experience using every app you review. Still, I highly recommend that you fully understand how they work before you publish blogs about them. If it looks like you’re phoning it in, people will stop reading.
Current Trends
Stay on top of news and press releases that outline new investment paths or opportunities and tell your readers about them. The quicker you respond to things like new opportunities or changes in the market, the more people will trust you and look to you first for information.
Support Content
Your blog will only be as successful as the tools you use to promote it. I recommend augmenting with at least two other key types of support content:
Email: In the beginning, your mail list may be small, but you can use your blog to direct traffic to squeeze pages where even small incentives can be used to get people to opt in on your email list. Over time, your email list will prove an invaluable resource, provided you are consistent with staying in front of your readers. Get into the habit of using email to promote your blog even while your audience is still small.
Social Media: Set up social media channels that reflect your branding and populate them with good content that relates either to the themes present in your blog or that point directly to new blog content. Engage regularly with your readers and share relevant news and current events with your own commentary added in. That part is important.
If all of this seems like a daunting task, don’t worry. At BeezContent, we have a solid team of writers with experience producing quality finance marketing content of all descriptions. Talk to us today about your ideas, and let’s work up a plan that sets your finance blogging efforts up for fast success.
