With AI overviews changing the search engine landscape, you’re probably wondering if blogging is even worth it anymore.
They’re the first thing you see when you open up Google, and I can’t lie … they usually give pretty decent summaries about the question or topic given.
But that doesn’t mean that blogging is dead. It just means that it’s changing. Read on to find out exactly what I mean and learn the answer to the million dollar question — if blogging is still worth it for fashion and lifestyle brands.
Do you need a blog for your fashion or lifestyle brand’s website?
No. It’s not as much of a need as say, a home page or product pages. There are plenty of fashion and lifestyle brands that are doing great without having a blog on their website.
However, having a blog can still be very beneficial for fashion and lifestyle brands, even in this day and age. Here are a few reasons why:
Enhances SEO + organic traffic
Yes, even with the rise and prevalence of AI overviews, blogging is still a great way to boost your website’s SEO and bring in more organic traffic that hopefully includes new ride-or-die fans of your brand. What a lot of people don’t realize is that AI isn’t making up overviews from scratch — it’s pulling information from well-ranking articles and websites.
Take a good, long look at this screenshot I took from my quick search about the difference between silk and satin.
Sure, the first thing that came up was an AI overview. But observe the little symbols that appear next to every point. They’re links to the blog articles and web pages that the AI got its information from. And on the far right side of the screen? You can see three articles that were used to create the overview, and all of them come from the blogs and websites of lifestyle brands.
So it’s not that AI overviews are making blogging redundant. AI overviews rely on blog articles to create these overviews. If your article ranks well, it’ll be right up there in the overview. Plus, some of the old principles of SEO still apply. If you scroll past the AI overview, you’ll still see the first page of the search engine and the highest ranking articles.
With the exception of one, all of these top-ranking articles come from company blogs! Very telling stuff, isn’t it?
Improves visibility
Ever heard the saying “don’t put all your eggs in one basket”? Of course you have. Blogging is just another way to increase visibility and build brand awareness.
The issue with social media is that your profile is never truly yours. Yes, you created all that content — but it technically belongs to the platform. If Instagram goes down or bans your page for some reason, then poof. All your hard work is gone. Emails are also great, but they can be deleted at any time.
Having a solid website is so important, and blogging is just another way to make it richer and deeper.
Creates a greater connection with your customers
Social media and email marketing are great and have their own unique set of benefits, but they can be limiting in terms of space. Even the longest-form captions and emails don’t let you dive quite as deep into a topic as a blog post does.
There’s also the headspace aspect. When people are on social media or checking their emails, they’re often in fast consumption mode. They probably want to quickly read and scroll onto the next thing, which is why short-form content reigns supreme on these platforms.
But when you open a blog post? You’re more committed to reading, learning, and engaging. You’ve got yourself settled on the couch with a nice hot beverage at your side, and you’re ready to dive in. Ok, maybe that’s not always the case, but you’ve got to admit your headspace is different when you’re truly in reading mode.
Blogs give you all the space you need to fully share your knowledge and educate your reader on the topic, therefore creating a deeper level of connection. Who knows, you just might end up writing the blog article that changes their perspective on an important topic — like learning the difference between silk and satin once and for all.
Positions you as an expert in your industry
A blog page filled with amazing resources for your audience is going to make you look good. I mean, why wouldn’t it?
Let’s say you have a solid skincare brand, and a blog filled with articles and resources about sustainability, zero-waste living, and skincare tips. Your brand is going to look more legit than the competitor brand that doesn’t have any of that.
Having a blog provides a lot of value to your audience, and it proves that you know your stuff. It’s like having a meal at a five star restaurant, where the server takes the time to explain the dish and the ingredients. You could have a delicious meal by itself, but the extra knowledge really proves the chef’s expertise.
Streamlines content creation as a whole
This might sound counterintuitive. After all, blogging is yet another form of marketing you’re adding to your already-full plate.
But what if I told you blogging makes one of the best foundations for a general content strategy?
Since blogs cover so many different aspects of a topic, you can use a single blog to create multiple emails and social media posts. It actually makes content creation easier, because you’re not reinventing the wheel every single time. Trust me, it really works. It’s a strategy I love using with my retainer clients.
How to adapt your blogging strategy in the AI overview age
Ok, so we know that while the internet has changed, some things remain the same. Blogging is still a great way to boost SEO and organic traffic, improve your brand’s overall visibility, build deeper connections with your audience, and position your brand as an authority/expert in your industry.
But it’s a fact that AI overviews have changed the game. You can still get your blogs to rank, you just need to adapt them so they’re more appealing to the bots.
While having high quality content is important, you might need to change the structure of your posts. Here are a few tweaks you can apply to your blog posts to make them more AI overview-friendly:
Use your titles and headers strategically
This has always been important, but now it’s extra important. You’ll want your titles and headers to really align with keywords and search terms, so save the prettier language for other forms of marketing and keep it very, very simple.
Think about the words and phrases that your ideal customer would use. And if you’re not sure what that might look like, think about the words and phrases that you might use when you’re looking for something specific.
For example: is it safe to wear gold jewelry in the pool?
It doesn’t sound as nice as a title like “poolside jewels: gold pieces for your hot girl summer”, but it’s what people are actually searching for. You can use the fun titles for your email marketing and social media campaigns. Blogging these days is really about strategy.
Make sure your content is clear, concise & conversational
AI overviews are clear, concise, and (for the most part) conversational, which means your blog content should also be clear, concise, and conversational.
It pulls phrases directly from blog posts, so you’ll want to write your sentences in a way that makes sense for an overview.
And that’s where the conversational aspect comes in. You can and should stick to your brand voice, which might lean more elegant or playful, but try to write sentences that a person would actually say (or search) in real life.
It’s not too dissimilar to older SEO blogging practices, but to familiarize yourself with this type of content you can spend some time looking at AI overviews and the kind of language they use, as well as the websites and blogs they tend to pull information from.
So there you have it! Despite the changing technological landscape, most would agree that blogging is still very much worth it for fashion and lifestyle brands. If you’re still on the fence, you can learn a little bit more about the benefits of blogging here. And if you’re ready to start blogging? Stay focused and stay committed. I’m sure you’ll be pleasantly surprised at the outcome.
Content writing & blog management services
Want to give blogging a go, but not sure you’ve personally got the bandwidth? I just might be your girl.
You can learn more about my content writing and blog management services for fashion and lifestyle brands here, or drop me a line if you’d like to personally chat about what I can do for you.
