Why Blogging Is Essential For Speech Pathologists
You’re a speech-language pathologist, so we’re willing to bet that you love to help people, teach people, and make lives easier. (In other words, you’re the salt of the earth!) The great thing about blogging is that it can help you do all three of those things, and on an even bigger scale than you ever could one-on-one!
Blogging is such a great resource for your current and future patients, your audience, and for you, in your daily practice. It can help you build relationships with your readers, and help new readers find you through Google searches. Plus, having a blog on your website solidifies your status as an online speech and language pro.
Keep reading for more on why your website really should have a blog, what steps you’ll need to take to get started, and why .
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Reasons to blog as a speech pathologist
There are so many reasons to start a business blog as an SLP! A blog can benefit not only your clients, it will save you time as the business owner and help generate leads, revenue, and add credibility for your business!
We had a hard time narrowing it down, but here are our top three reasons to take the leap into blogging:
Establish yourself as an industry expert
You have information that your audience would pay you to learn. Why not use your blog to make your website their go-to source? Having a blog allows people to connect with you, to learn more about what you do, and to start to trust you before they ever meet you!
By demonstrating your expertise and industry knowledge, you show readers how reliable you are as a source for research-backed information, and you make working with you a total no-brainer.
Easily answer FAQs
We know you got into your profession to help people… but be honest. Do you ever get tired of answering the same question over and over again in your DMs or via email?
With a blog, you can pre-answer all of your FAQs so that when they inevitably get asked again, all you have to do is kindly share a link and offer to answer any follow-ups they have! This makes you look super professional, saves you tons of time, serves your audience well, and it helps people who aren’t brave enough to ask you their questions to feel like they aren’t alone and that their thoughts are valid!
Attract potential clients with SEO optimized content
When your audience has a question that you can answer, they’re probably going to google first. How great would it be if someone searches a question, Google sends them your blog post that answers their exact question, and then they realize how much you know about their problem and reach out to you to book a session?
When you write blog posts about specific questions or things your audience is searching, you can optimize for SEO and rank in Google for their searches. Now, full disclosure, it’s not that simple and for competitive searches you’ll likely need help from an SEO expert, but you can do a lot on your own with some simple keyword research, and we walk you through how to do exactly that below!
Related: Is SEO a priority for your blog? Wondering if you can DIY it or if you should consider hiring an expert? Read our blog post on When to DIY and When You Should Hire an SEO Specialist.
How to start a speech pathologist blog
Starting a blog is simple, but not as simple as just opening up a new page and typing. Thankfully, we’ve broken down the process into four easy steps, and created this free Content Planning Worksheet to get you started!
Make a copy of the Content Planning Template and keep it open in another tab as we move through the next steps!
Step one: identify your content pillars
First, identify the 4-6 content categories (or pillars) that you feel will represent and capture the topics you’ll blog about. These are broad “buckets” of content that all of your more specific, detailed blog post topics will be housed under.
Examples of content pillars for SLPs
- Early literacy skills
- ASL
- Encouraging vocabulary
- Speech therapy
- Speech and language concerns and conditions
- Speech development and milestones
- First words
- Sentences
- Songs and rhymes
Replace the values in square brackets on the Content Pillars sheet of your Content Planning Worksheet with your content pillars. You can also add sub-pillars if it makes sense for your business.
Pro Tip: Check out your competitors and see how they’re organizing their content for inspiration! Most blogs have categories or tags to organize their posts which can give you an indication.
Step two: brainstorm topics for your blog
Now, on the Content Planning sheet of your Content Planning Template, list a few topics in the ‘keyword’ columns for each pillar.
For example, if your content pillar is speech therapy, some blog topics might be:
- What to expect in speech therapy
- How to prepare for speech therapy
- How to get more out of speech therapy at home
- The benefit of early intervention
- Speech therapy for toddlers
- Speech therapy for preschoolers
- Speech therapy for school-aged children
Step three: dig into keyword research
Now that you have some blog post topic ideas, it’s time to do a little keyword research and fill out the rest of the pink columns on your Content Planning sheet.
By building each blog post around a keyword, you’re ensuring that the content you create is relevant, and that your audience wants what you have! This saves you from wasting time creating content that people aren’t actually looking for. And, it makes you more likely to rank in Google.
Not sure where to start with all this? Our post on how to do keyword research will help! You don’t need to be an SEO expert to pull the basic information. For each topic idea (or keyword) find the Search Volume and the SERP Competition and add it to your Content Planning sheet.
Pro tip: find the less competitive keywords
Not all keywords are the right ones for your blog. Bigger, more board keywords like “speech therapy” might be relevant, but there’s already so much content out there that it will be almost impossible to compete. (Especially if you’re coming up against sources like the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association or Today’s Parent.)
If your blog is new or even just less authoritative than those other sources, you’ll want to pick longer keywords or phrases (also known as ‘long tail’ keywords). These keywords tend to get less searches per month, but they’re easier to rank for and there’s less competition. So, there’s a better chance that your post will actually rank and be seen by new readers!
So instead of “how to teach toddler to talk” which has 1000 monthly searches, but the the first listing is from healthline.com, try “toddler toys to encourage talking” which might only have 40 monthly searches, but it’s much less competitive to rank for.
Step four: decide on a content creation workflow
Instead of posting haphazardly or waiting until the mood strikes, it’s best to be proactive by creating a content creation workflow.
To do this, you’ll need to decide on two things: how often you want to write and how often you want to publish new posts.
In terms of how often to post, for SEO benefits, we recommend no fewer than 2 posts per month, with each post falling between 700-1200 words.
For how often to write, you have three options:
- Quarterly Batching: Set aside a few days each quarter to create all the blog posts you’ll need for three whole months!
- Monthly Batching: Write all of the month’s blog posts at once, in one or two days.
- Weekly Writing: Create one post post each week (or two).
Block out the time in your calendar in recurring appointments specific for blog writing & publishing. On that day, pour yourself some coffee, and get ready to write!
SLPs who do blogging right
Wee Talkers
Why we love Wee Talkers: Bias alert! Carly is a long-time friend and client. We help her with her blog each month, so of course it’s one of our favs!
Each of Carly’s blog posts either answers a question from her Instagram community, supplements information she shares on her feed, or ties back to a focus keyword. So, every single post serves her audience directly and/or helps new readers who need speech and language help find her through Google.
Carly also does a great job of mixing a friendly tone of voice with her professional expertise and her experience as a mom of two girls. Her content feels approachable, relatable, and her tips are easy to implement— no matter how busy parents are with their little ones!
Snaps for Carly and the Wee Talkers blog!
Busy Bee Speech
Why we love Busy Bee Speech: They choose blog topics that their audience is searching for, and write up the answers in clear and concise language. The result? Blogs that are skimmable, actionable, and binge-able!
Ready to start blogging?
You bet you are! You got through all those years of university, you show up for your patients and their families every day, AND you started an online business. There’s nothing you CAN’T do!
Plus, you don’t have to do it alone. We’re on your side and in this with you!
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P.S. Still have questions? Want more blogging help? Book a Consultation and we’ll walk you through how we can help.
