Connecting and collaborating with business peers seems harder, not easier. With so many social platforms, which is the best? And don’t even get me started on notification fatigue. Am I right?

We’re a bit biased here,  but we believe hosting a social network on your own website is the best solution. Writing on your blog about your experiences as a remote worker or digital nomad is an excellent way to position yourself as an expert. But where is the conversation? Collaboration?

Think of the possibilities. What if you could gather your colleagues together in one social space? Would it be a LinkedIn or Facebook group? Having both would double the work. Where is the best place to share business tips?

Networking and local business groups are great ways to collaborate, learn, and even join forces to gain bigger clients.

Collaborate Together

Collaboration is underrated in our individualistic culture today. Yet there are so many tools for project management, asynchronous communication, and don’t forget email. But when do we really have those moments of epiphany? Do we ever put ourselves in a space where we could brainstorm?

Engaging online in a community that fosters psychological safety is the ideal place. It’s important to business innovation to facilitate these idea spaces. Whether it’s an incubator or a think tank,  innovation depends upon slow hunches and idea collisions.  We can gather together  — in person — but travel costs can become quite a barrier. It lacks spontaneity.

Learn Together

Startup incubators often teach the skills that Business Schools don’t. How do you form your LLC? What should your brand name? How do you hire your first employee? How can you realistically scale? What does that timeline look like.

These pain points for growth feel daunting at the time, but when businesses gather together, they prosper together. Lunch and Learns are a perfect example. We learn from one another by teaching one another.

By learning together in your community of innovators, you can learn from other people’s mistakes and go forward with your own ideas. Launching a new product is scary. Being supported and supporting others in your field is its own reward.

Get Bigger Projects Together

When freelancers team up there is no limit to the size of the project they can win. Assemble your dream team, submit the proposal, and  do the work. You’ll be surprised how often your team referred. Your online community can have groups for projects and recruiting team members. Think of the potential.

Start Your Social Business Network Today

It’s your community, your way with Infinite. You have all the tools you need to engage your community. Create your community your way. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t start today.

Let’s level up your blogging skills. Publishing articles as part of your community’s content marketing strategy is a great way to build your online community in numbers and in education.

The next topic in this series is internal links. If you missed the last post, we talked about outbound links.

What Are Internal Links?

From a strategic standpoint, internal links are part of healthy content marketing. From a hospitality standpoint, you’d like people who visit your website to be able to find things much like you’d want a house guest to have access to fresh towels and soap.

Internal linking among your published articles is digital hospitality. For example, our link above to our previous article about outbound links is an internal link.

“What internal linking does is gives context to the different pages. By linking to another page on your website, it says this page is also important.“

John Locke

As John Locke mentioned, internal linking helps your users go on a path to learn more about your community and your business. Maybe some of your products go together. Mention them in your articles and link to their product pages or previous articles.

Is It Self-Centered to Link Internally?

No. It is not self-centered to link internally. People who find your blog post or product page may not know about the book you published last year that’s completely relevant to a particular article. They might not know that you are selling a new toolset for their bicycles.

Content marketing means you are creating content on your website to help your community. This is through education either on a concept, tool, or product. Linking to relevant articles you’ve also published helps them further. That is seen as significant.

How Do I Use Internal Links?

No matter if you link to external sites or to products or pages on your own site, the link should be natural. It shouldn’t be like how your cousin Jerry awkwardly drops in the fact that he met John Wayne back in 1972 at every single Christmas party. It should be a natural segue.

“In order to create lots of internal links, you have to have lots of internal pages. The first step to a killer internal linking strategy is to have a killer content marketing strategy. You can’t have one without the other.”

Neil Patel

If your internal link sounds like a natural next step for your reader, they will stay on your site longer. That’s always a good thing.

Engage Your Community

Content marketing or blogging (see what I did there?) brings people to your site  — which helps build your community. You can host a growing and thriving community. How will you engage your community?

You have an eCommerce store and you’ve optimized your product pages. You have great images, reviews, and stellar copy. Are you blogging about your online products, too? If you’re not, let me just say that you should. It gives you an opportunity to educate, put your brand before potential customers on social media, and it signals to search engines that your website is active and relevant.

How Do I Write A Blog Post About My Product?

When writing a blog post about your product take an angle of how this product provides a solution. Do your customers have trouble hiking? Not anymore! Your walking sticks will help them with balance and stamina. Do your customers hate their bicycle seats? No longer! Your seats are superior, lighter, and more comfortable.

“A simple yet highly effective way to get started with content marketing for your business is to think of all the starting-point queries people have about your products and industry. Using your blog, you can answer these queries as individual articles.” Neil Patel

Describe the problem and provide the solution. I always imagine I’m on an infomercial late at night on TV or maybe a radio ad on ESPN. It feels cheesy and awkward, but it does help shift your writing style to persuasive copywriting instead of dry reporting or technical documentation. Admittedly, this is a controversial approach in the eCommerce space. However, that mindset will help your mindset and inform the tonality. Have some fun!

How Is a Blog Post Different than the Product Page?

The product page has one purpose: make the sale. While we’re talking about the sale, don’t bury your price or order button. Make it easy for people to purchase. The product page is for a description, prices, shipping information, and other pertinent details. Some features may be included to convince the buyer but, truth be told, they’ve already decided. People aren’t robots. They’re stimulated by their brain stem (old brain) and use emotions (limbic system) in purchasing decisions. More often than not, they then do research (neocortex) so they feel that they’re doing their due diligence. It’s the way our brain works. The blog post serves to educate and persuade; the product page features buying details and reviews.

“The old brain quickly assesses situations to determine if you are at risk or in danger. If it senses your well-being is in jeopardy, it forces you to react and move away from the potential threat. To break the status quo, you literally have to wake your prospects’ old brain by showing them how their current status quo is untenable, unsustainable, and even unsafe.” Harvard Business Review

Your Community and eCommerce

People need your products so why not educate, entertain, and embrace the community around them? In combination with regular publishing, your online store will draw people to your site and the community keeps them there. With EDD and WooCommerce extensions, you can have the best of both worlds — eCommerce and Community.