There are a ton of ways your store to convince shoppers to make a purchase. Well-rounded product pages, quality copywriting, targeted social media advertising, emails — they’ll all get the job done.

But some of your potential customers might not be ready to make a commitment. They might be new to your products or services, or learning what separates your store from another. And that’s why educational content is an awesome addition, because it allows shoppers to learn about you in a natural way, and at their own pace.

At WooCommerce, we’ve ramped up the creation of content, its promotion, and its usage in our marketing over the last 15 months. It’s become a critical part of our sales process, and something that we can no longer imagine operating without.

Today I’ll be pulling back the curtain to give you a behind-the-scenes look at how we produce and use our content with sales in mind, all so you can take away some ideas and inspiration for the content on your store.

If you’re interested in seeing how a business like ours uses content marketing, keep reading!

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Sometimes, it seems like there are more blogs out there than readers.

This has gotten to be even more of a problem with the rise of community content sites like Tumblr and Reddit that give blog readers one-stop shops for information on specialty topics that interest them.

Only a small percentage of blogs have a regular readership. The high rates of abandonment among new bloggers is part of the reason why, but a much larger part is that too many of them are taking Field of Dreams literally and assuming that simply writing quality content will magically draw viewers.

So, if building it doesn’t ensure they’ll come, what will?

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Remember that the first goal of blogging is not just to get more traffic, but to get a specific outcome. You want more subscribers, more sales, or more people engaging with your brand.

Despite the internet’s collective dream of “going viral,” that’s not the best way to build a customer base. Having a million hits on one post – and no others – won’t do much for your business. Traffic on its own isn’t very useful if it doesn’t convert.

So instead of aiming for massive popularity, it’s better to steadily build interest in your brand among an audience that may be smaller but more devoted.

There’s a process to this, and it’s often difficult to get right, but I’ll take you through the basics you need to get started:

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A lot of the time when lists like this are put together, the emphasis is usually placed on small business blogs that talk about how to run and manage a business. And while such lists are certainly useful, I thought it would be a good idea to put together a list of blogs actually created and managed by retail store owners. These blogs don’t talk about how to blog; rather, they show how it’s done and lead by example.

Here are 15 retail blogs I’ve come across that are run by small shop owners (for the most part) that can give you some real-life inspiration when putting together a blog for your e-commerce site.

1. Taylor Stitch

Taylor Stitch is an online and brick and mortar clothing shop for both men and women and they’ve really got a handle on this blogging business.

They have a dedicated Journal, which paints verbal and visual portraits of their products in action. It has a narrative style that’s rather engaging, which breaks up the occasional product post.

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Getting a new comment on your blog can feel like a small victory. After all, it means that someone read your post and cared enough to type out a few words. That’s pretty cool! Unless it’s spam or someone trying to be a troll. Then that’s not so cool. Even so, comments on blogs have become sort of a mainstay. Yet more and more people are opting out, and I can’t help but ask “Why?”

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When you run an online business, it’s important to blog regularly.

Of course, you know this already. Without a blog, it would be very difficult to get leads. Blog posts are one of the ways through which online entrepreneurs get people to signup to an email list. And your email list gives you access to a lead’s inbox, which is an important place to be.

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