Blogging is an ideal content marketing strategy for businesses that aren’t into “loud” and blatant promotions but realize the need to peddle their goods. This is why firms that provide business process outsourcing (BPO) services in the Philippines suggest blogging to clients who want to market their brands in a manner that doesn’t feel like marketing at all.

Entering the blogosphere, however, doesn’t automatically guarantee content marketing success. There s a predetermined list of things that you need to do to captivate an audience and turn them into customers. Among those requisites, choosing the topics to write about is perhaps the most important step. Some put all their efforts in making sure that their blog posts are well-written and only tackle topics that they feel like writing about.

While having wordsmiths sculpt your messages into fine pieces of digestible content is highly important, you might still end up defeating the purpose of blogging if your posts don t suit the taste of your readers. There has to be careful planning in choosing your topics so that they can act as the backbone supporting your online presence and longevity as a business blog.

So how do you choose which subjects to publish on your blog? Here are four fundamental steps:

1. Know your audience

This means more than just compiling a demographic breakdown of your target market. You have to go beneath the surface and know more than their age group and economic standing. You should have deep knowledge of their likes, dislikes, consumer behaviors, and other preferences.

2. Identify your readers’ concerns

It’s a sign of being an amateur if you make your blog all about you. Yes, your ultimate goal is to introduce or promote your brand, but the center of your posts must be your audience. You should be able to provide what they re searching for. In line with doing the first step—knowing your audience—is understanding the challenges and concerns they want to be addressed. Ultimately, what you write about should offer a solution to the queries they are likely to type into Google.

3. Define your core message

In connecting with your audience, it’s essential to establish a definite identity of your brand—what it is, what it stands for, its values, its goals. How you define it becomes your core message, which your audience will use to identify you as you build your presence online. Then you can incorporate this with a particular topic that is most relevant at the moment. For instance, if your core message is to “spread positivity,” you can tailor this according to current hot topics or upcoming events. Since the holidays are coming, you should probably be coming up with ways of spreading positivity this Christmas season.

Once you’ve taken the initial steps, you can now connect the dots between your brand, your audience, their needs, and your core message. How can your message address the concerns faced by your readers? Will your site pop up first when people search for answers that you’ve tackled on your blog? Getting the answers right to these questions depends on how well-tailored your publishing practices are to the identity and needs of your audience.