The topic of store blogs came up time and time again at the recent Retail Shippers Expo in Las Vegas. It’s very encouraging to hear of so many stores starting and maintaining really great blogs, and reaping the benefits!
Blogs are a core teaching of Fahim’s in his social media seminars and posts, and he is by all means the expert on this topic. But I want to share a little of my own experience, as my store blog has proven very successful for my own business.
Blogs improve your search engine optimization (SEO) exponentially, and every business should consider having one associated with their website. For me, my entire site is blog-format, and that style–keeping it always fresh and new–has done wonders for my Google hits. And I just learned recently, thanks to #FahimFix, that blog posts need at least 250 characters to count in Google.
What you post on your blog should be punctual, professional, and include just the right touch of personal. We use our blogs to share industry news, advise of store holidays, express gratitude, commend other businesses and groups for doing a great job, and share community events and happenings. A good way to figure out what to post is to think of your business as a living, breathing organism. What would it say? Who would it thank? What would it want to tell everyone?
Below, I’ll share my latest store blog post about my five-year business anniversary. It’s important to express our gratitude to our customers often and sincerely. To check out more of my posts, please visit unclemartysoffice.com. I’d also recommend checking out some other impressive blogs in our industry, including themailboxstore.net/blog and islandshipcenter.com/blog.
#MarketingwithMarty #AskUncleMarty
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It’s our five year anniversary!
Uncle Marty’s Shipping Office opened on September 1, 2011. For the past five years, it has been our privilege to serve you–the Ithaca, Cornell, and Collegetown communities. Truly, it’s been a privilege!
On this milestone, we need to take a moment to thank you–our loyal advocates, customers, and friends–for your outstanding support.
Thank you for stopping by our store that first time, whether that was last week or five years ago. Time after time, visit after visit, we love seeing you come back again and again, and are so grateful for the sincere recommendations and referrals to your friends, family, and co-workers.
Thank you for your trust and patronage, which has allowed us to grow year after year, expanding our services and offerings to cater to our unique market here in Collegetown, Ithaca, the Southern Tier, and the Finger Lakes. We simply opened a store, and soon found that we were able to fill a huge need in our region. We are so honored to have become the dedicated shipping, printing, and storage partner for many Cornell University and Ithaca College departments, clubs, and teams, as well as local businesses, artists, artisans, students, academics, and so many other various and sundry Ithacans. We love growing, and have become really good at it (with some serious big plans pending)!
Thank you for all of the overwhelming positive reviews. Because of you, we’ve become Yelp superstars! We love receiving your kind statements, reading them, sharing them, and above all earning them. We will continue to always give five-star service, understanding that your decision to do business at Uncle Marty’s must be earned with our dedicated best.
Thank you for your patience during the past 16 months of Collegetown development. We know that the construction in Collegetown has been difficult to navigate, yet these developments will bring new life, vibrancy, and potential to our fine neighborhood. We are indebted to our loyal, dedicated customers who have truly gone out of their way to support us through the construction dust. We hope to have our road paved by the end of this month, and have negotiated a new, bigger customer and truck loading zone near our store as well as a couple of handicapped parking meters. These new buildings are going to be fabulous; our new street and sidewalks will be beautiful; the future looks very, very bright!
Thank you for your loving, kind support while Marty was going through serious chemotherapy in 2012 and 2013. When Marty found out he had a rare, aggressive form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma in the fall of 2012, he honestly didn’t know what would happen to the business during his months away for treatment. But Cindy (his mom), Dub (his Dad), Ingrid (his sister), and Allen (his brother) all stepped up to carry our young business through the hiccup. Now, three and a half years cancer-free with nothing but hope for the future, Marty remains overwhelmed by the love poured out during that unprecedented time. As we move forward, continuing our fundraising in the store for the American Cancer Society through Marty’s team, Cancer Crushers, our gratefulness for your continued support remains strong.
The past five years have been full of surprises, and through it all we have come out smiling. Now, we are extremely excited to announce that we’ve renewed our lease at 206A Dryden Road for another five years! We’re in this for the long term, and look forward to many more years working together to make our community the best that it can be!
So what do the next five years hold? Plenty of good things! With the new buildings surrounding us in Collegetown, we’ll be expanding our services and doing some renovations of our own. We hope to have a new business center with 24-hour private mailboxes opened within a few months, have just signed on to offer textbook buyback, and are exploring lots of other new offerings. It’s an exciting time!
Our five year anniversary is truly a cause for celebration! And we have cupcakes to prove it! So swing by on Tuesday, September 6th, to get frosting-faced, and party on!
#UncleMartys #Collegetown #FiveYearAnniversary #Gratitude #XOXO
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For more information on Marty, please visit unclemartysoffice.com.
Source: AMBC Blog