Does my business website need a blog?

The page list for your new website has a Blog page on it, somewhere between About and Contact. Nobody asked whether you'd write for it. Someone once told you Google likes blogs, so it stayed.

That page costs money to design and build either way. Whether it pays you back depends on two things you can check before the build starts: what your buyers ask before they hire you, and who will write the answers.

Does your business website need a blog?

Not by default.

A business website needs a blog only when your buyers look up questions before they hire someone, and a person on your team will write the answers regularly. Without both, a few strong service pages do more for you.

Google's SEO starter guide says content people find "compelling and useful" will likely shape how your site shows up in search more than anything else it suggests. It doesn't say that content has to live in a blog. A clear service page counts.

Find the row closest to your business:

Your situation	Blog?	Put the effort here first
Most work comes from referrals	Probably not	Service pages and past work a referred buyer can check
People find you nearby and buy on the spot	Probably not	Your Google Business Profile, hours and prices
Buyers compare options for weeks	Often yes	Posts that answer what they ask in those weeks
You type the same answers into emails	Yes, if someone writes	Your best replies, turned into posts
Nobody will write	No	The same answers, added to your service pages

A "probably not" still leaves room to answer common questions, on a service page or in an FAQ. Our guide to which pages your website needs helps you decide where each answer goes.

What can a blog do that service pages can't?

A blog does three jobs that service pages do badly.

It meets buyers before they're ready to hire. A service page talks to someone who already knows they need you. A post reaches them a step earlier: a hypothetical roofer's answer to "how long does a flat roof last" meets a homeowner months before the quote.

It shows how you think. Anyone can list services. A post explaining how you'd handle an awkward case shows experience a buyer can judge. Google's guidance on helpful content asks whether content shows "first-hand expertise and a depth of knowledge" and encourages a byline (the author's name) where readers expect one.

It gives people something to send. You paste the link into a reply instead of typing the explanation again. A partner forwards it. Another site links to it.

End every post with a link to the service it relates to, or it does the reading part and skips the hiring part. Our guide to what a service page needs covers where that reader should land.

When is a blog the wrong job?

Sometimes the honest answer is no, and it's better to know before the page is designed.

• Nobody will write. If the plan is "we'll get to it after launch", decide now who "we" is.
• Your buyers don't look things up first. People who hire you on a friend's recommendation, or walk in from the street, aren't reading articles beforehand.
• The topics drift from what you sell. Google lists producing "lots of content on many different topics in hopes that some of it might perform well" as a warning sign. Holiday posts mostly attract readers who won't hire you.

Then there's the blog that stopped. A visitor who sees the newest post is two years old may wonder whether anyone reads the contact form. Don't just change the dates: Google lists that, without real changes, as a sign of writing for search engines.

What to do with a blog you've stopped writing

• Keep posts that still answer a real question and get visits. Check their facts and prices.
• Take the Blog link out of the main menu.
• Remove posts that are out of date or off topic. If one still gets visits, ask your developer to forward its address to the closest page, as our guide to redesigning without losing SEO explains.

How often do you need to post?

Less often than you've probably been told, as long as you keep going.

Google doesn't set a publishing frequency. Pick a rhythm you could keep up in your busiest month, and count a post as finished when it answers one question well.

Length isn't a target either. Asked whether Google has a preferred word count, its guidance answers "No, we don't."

For a small team, once a month is a sensible rhythm to test: twelve answers a year. Writing three in a slow week and publishing them a month apart works too.

What does the website need so posting is easy?

If publishing a post means emailing a developer, the blog will stop.

Builders such as Squarespace and Wix, and WordPress, usually include a blog. On a custom-coded website, someone has to build the posts section: where you write, the post page and the list of posts. That's build work, so it belongs in the quote.

Before you sign off the finished site, try these on a test post yourself:

• Write a post, add a photo and preview it before it goes live, without help
• Open the preview on your phone with a long title and several screens of text
• Check that your name appears on the post
• Pick the related service and see a link to it at the end
• Fill in the post's own title and description for Google
• Save a half-finished draft and find it again the next day

The editor login should belong to your business, so add it to your launch handover list.

If you're having a site built, send this to your developer before the quote is final:

We'd like a blog on the new website. Please give each post fields for the title, summary, main photo, text, author, date, a title and description for Google, and the related service, shown as a link at the end. I need to save drafts and preview posts on my phone, and photos should resize automatically. Please test the post page with a long title and a long post, and keep the Blog link out of the menu until we've published three posts.

If a blog is worth it for your business, we can build the website so posting doesn't depend on us. We design the post page with the rest of the site and set up a posts section in Keystatic or Sanity, so you write, preview and publish on your own. The writing stays with you. If your current site is custom-coded, we can add a blog once the code is in good enough shape to build on; we quote after reviewing it, and that review is paid work. Start with a free intro call that doesn't commit you to anything, or reach us at hi@aruno.studio, on WhatsApp or on Telegram at @mihaipostelnicu.

Which posts should you write first?

Your first posts are already half-written in your sent emails. Call this the sent-folder test.

1) Search your sent folder

Copy every question from six months of replies to people who hadn't hired you yet, in their words.

2) Check what people typed into Google

In Google Search Console, open the Performance report and look at Queries: the searches people typed before your site appeared. If Search Console isn't set up, our guide to getting onto Google starts there.

3) Cross out what belongs elsewhere

Questions only existing customers ask belong in a welcome email. Basics like what a service includes and costs belong on the service page. If one service produces most of the questions, it may deserve its own page.

4) Answer the three most common

One question per post. Answer it in the first few lines, the way you'd explain it on a call, then add the detail and the link to the service. Next time the question lands in your inbox, reply with two lines and the link.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a blog if I already post on LinkedIn or Instagram? Not necessarily. Social posts mostly reach your followers; a page on your website can turn up when someone searches the question, and it stays on a site you control. Write the answer once there and share it with the link.

Can AI or a hired writer write my blog posts? They can help draft, but the knowledge has to be yours. Google says using automation, including AI, to generate content "with the primary purpose of manipulating ranking in search results" breaks its spam policies, and it calls made-up author names deceptive.

How long before a blog brings in enquiries? There's no reliable number, so be wary of anyone who promises one. After a few months of regular posts, check Search Console for which posts appear in search and your analytics for whether readers reach a service page. If they visit but don't get in touch, see why traffic doesn't turn into enquiries.

How much does it cost to add a blog to a website? On a website builder, a blog is often part of the plan you already pay for. On a custom-coded site, the posts section is design and build work priced into the project, and on an existing custom site we quote once we've reviewed the code. After that, the main cost is your time.

That Blog page in your plan is a promise to write. Open your sent folder, count the questions worth answering in public, and keep the page or drop it based on that list.