Why businesses should blog & how blogging impacts business 1. Allows you to establish yourself as experts in your industry. 2. Gives you a reason to touch base with your current client base/customers 3. Allows you to establish a relationship with potential clients. 4. Allows you to give your business a personality. 5. Allows you to establish a great deal of goodwill (wow this business is giving me all this information for free. How nice is that?) 6. Creates opportunities for cross-promotion which gives access to the client bases of other businesses 7. Gives you the opportunity to drive people to your website, and keep them there (reduces bounce rate). 8. Is the most time and cost-effective way to increase search engine rankings. Which makes it one of the most cost-effective marketing strategies you can employ. How to blog when you are not a writer 1. Lots of people tell me I can t blog, I am not a writer. My response to them is always if you can talk, then you can write. 2. There are many ways to blog that don t involve writing: Video blogging Micro blogging (twitter, facebook) Image blogging (instagram, flikr) 3. BUT REMEMBER - if you can talk you can write. And writing gives the best connections. If you are really struggling, dictate your post/story into your iphone and then transcribe it. There s your blog post. 4. IF YOU ARE REALLY STRUGGLING - Write your blog post and send it to me. I will either tweak it for you to bring it up to scratch... or tell you what you need to do. The important thing is that you write how you talk: conversational and jargon free.
What you should be blogging about The topics on which you could blog are truly infinite but a good goal for each post is for it to do one of three things: For example: Inspire Inform Interact Inspire: If you sell clothing, do a What I wore post. If you re a cake decorator, share pictures of your latest creations. Inform: Make a list of the questions you get asked all the time by customers. Then write a post to answer each question Interact: Is there a hot topic in your industry right now? Are you looking for feedback on a product idea? Share your opinion on it and invite readers to share their thoughts in the comments. Also, see resource sheet at the end of this pdf titled 50 ideas for business blog posts QUICK WORKSHOP - TWO BLOG POST IDEAS FOR EACH OF THE BELOW: INSPIRE 1. 2. INFORM 1. 2. INTERACT 1. 2.
The biggest business blogging mistakes 1. Putting a sales call-to-action at the end of blog posts. 2. Blogging inconsistently. 3. Terrible titles (write your title like a newspaper headline - needs to have a HOOK. 4. Hosting your blog on a different domain to your website (you miss out on all the SEO benefits) 5. Failing to promote your blog posts. 6. Using a voice that is not conversational (write like you speak!) 7. Thinking your blog is about you and not your client/customer. Your reader only cares about themselves, not you. If the post doesn t benefit them in any way, then you won t achieve any level of connection with them. How to get people to comment on your blog posts 1. Don t say everything otherwise your reader will have nothing to say/add in the comments. 2. Ask a question. 3. Keep things short and sweet. Anything over 750 words and the reader starts skimming. You don t want them to skim, you want them to get to the end of the post wanting a bit more.
Resource sheet: 50 ideas for business blog posts Here are 50 ideas for business blog posts (from http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/223023) 1. Customer success story. When you receive a great testimonial from a customer, ask for permission to turn it into a post. Use the post to solicit more customer stories. 2. Mention a popular post. If you notice a post by a popular blogger in your niche getting a lot of attention, add your viewpoint and link to the original post. Be sure to let that A-list blogger know about your comment and link. 3. Disagree with a popular opinion. Get traffic by stirring up controversy and taking a contrary position. 4. Riff on the news. How are current events affecting your customers? Run a Google Alerton certain keywords related to your business or industry to find relevant news items to discuss. 5. Compile a link roundup. If you notice several interesting opinions on a topic, you can pull them together into a single post of the best ideas. 6. Play off the familiar. Mention a celebrity or a pop culture touchstone and your readers will instantly relate. 7. Answer the questions everyone is asking. An FAQ post shows you re responsive and saves customers time. 8. Pose your own question. What would you like to know about your customers? Just ask, and let your readers create the content. 9. Talk about trends. You convey authority when you tell how things are evolving in your industry. 10. Discuss future plans. Give readers a sneak peek at what you ll do in the coming year to start generating interest. 11. Review a book. If you ve read a book you think customers might like, give it a write-up. 12. Review a product or service. This shouldn t be one of your own products or services or a direct competitor s offering, but rather a related item your customers might want to learn about. 13. Comparison test. Provide even more value by comparing two or more related products or services. 14. Post a video. Create variety with a video post. You can give a sneak preview of a new product or show a promotional event. 15. Make a podcast. Record a quick interview with an expert, or just give a few of your own useful tips. 16. Create an infographic. Fact-filled, graphic posts get shared a lot on social networks.this infographic got more than 10,000 retweets. 17. Report on a conference. Quote inspiring speakers or tell readers about the latest trends and ideas from the conference that you ll be implementing.
Resource sheet: 50 ideas for business blog posts cont // 18. Go behind the scenes. Give readers a photo or video tour of your plant, customer service desk or the backroom of your store. 19. Explain how you do it. Do you have a special way you make your product, handle returns or welcome new customers? Describe your process. 20. Staff profiles. Give a human face to your company by introducing new or seasoned employees. 21. Show your charity work. If your business gives back to the community, post a video or photo essay of that park your staff cleaned up. 22. Gush about your idols. Talk about the blogs you read regularly or the thought leaders who inspire you. Be sure to alert those bloggers and business gurus so they ll spread the word. 23. Have a debate. Invite someone who disagrees with your views to do a Point/Counterpoint post. 24. Talk about your blunders. Everyone loves to read about business failures. End your post by telling how you re fixing the problem. 25. Create a regular feature. Do a customer of the week spotlight or create a monthly collection of the best online articles that match your customers interests. 26. Write a series. If you d like to teach customers something complicated, break the topic into several parts. Series are an effective way to turn casual readers into subscribers. 27. Make a prediction. Everybody wants to know what may happen in the future, so share your opinion. 28. Conduct market research. Are you wondering which product name would attract more customers? Hold a virtual focus group on a blog post. 29. Create a contest. Offer a prize for the most interesting customer suggestion or use of your product. 30. Take a reader poll. SurveyMonkey makes this easy. Or you can simply set up a poll on your business Facebook page and draw readers to like your page. 31. Share poll or contest results. Don t leave readers hanging; do a follow-up post to announce the results. 32. Create an award. Giving a best of honor is guaranteed to get attention. Readers will want to check out who won, and all the finalists will likely share the news in social media. 33. Share your customer feedback. If you use customer comment cards or do customer surveys, turn some highlights into a post. 34. Reveal industry secrets or expose lies. When you promise to tell people what others won t, it s sure to be a hit. 35. Tell the story of your origins. Everybody loves to read about other people s dreamsand challenges, so write about why and how you started your business.
Resource sheet: 50 ideas for business blog posts cont // 36. Share a highlight. What were the big milestones in your company s history? Tell about an important moment and how it changed your business. 37. Keyword posts. Check your Google Analytics to see which keyword searches bring customers to your site. Then do posts on those topics. 38. Read your competitors. If you re out of ideas, see what topics are drawing a crowd on your competitors blogs and give your own take on those subjects. You can even link to your competitor s post. Readers will think that s cool. 39. Display a sense of humor. Everyone loves business owners who can laugh at themselves when something goes wrong at the office. Consider giving a how-to post a funny spin. 40. Show your passion. What aspect of your business gets you excited? What customer experience was especially gratifying? Tell those personal stories. 41. Share your vision. If you re different from competitors because of your philosophy, talk about it. 42. Informational, how-to. Is there more than one way to use your product or service? Describe one of the less common uses in a how-to post. 43. Tips and tricks. Don t have time for a step-by-step how-to post? Give readers a few random suggestions for how to get more out of your product. 44. Celebrity Q&A. An interview post can be quick and easy if you simply email questions to an expert of interest to your customers. If you have some dream interview subjects, go ahead and ask if they ll participate. You ll probably be surprised how many say yes. 45. Be inspiring. Sometimes, customers would just like to feel good. Write about something you found inspiring in the course of your day or how you keep a positive work culture. 46. Resource list. You could spotlight your vendors, companies you partner with, or a list of good books related to your business. 47. How you got the idea for your product. This is an opportunity to credit team members and tell an interesting story about product development. 48. A day in the life. Give customers an hour-by-hour account of a typical day at your company. 49. Offer something special. Announce a party that gives your best customers a first look at a new product or create a giveaway just for blog subscribers. 50. Round up the best of your blog. If you think some of your best stuff is buried in the archive, repost your 10 favorite posts from the past year.
Resource sheet: Twitter for newbies Twitter is a great business tool - not so much for connecting with potential clients/customers... but for connecting with thought leaders in your industry and establishing yourself as a thought leader. When you re new to twitter it s a bit of a scary place. Everything moves at breakneck speed and it s hard to keep track of what the heck is going on. It took me three shots at twitter to finally get it and now I have to say, it s my favourite social media hangout. Despite what many people think, twitter is not somewhere people go just share their most inane of thoughts, it is actually all about the conversation. It s very hard though to get involved in the conversation (and thus get the best out of twitter ) when you re new to the hood so here is a bit of a gentle progression for getting your head around it all. 1. Start following people How do you know who to follow? Well to be honest, this is the hardest bit when you re completely new. I am fairly sure twitter suggests people for you to follow based on your industry or who you re friends with on facebook so start there. Another way to do it is to think of major thought leaders or influencers in your industry or interest groups and do a search for their name. 2. Observe At the start, just sit back and observe. When I first started on twitter I used it as a news aggregator more than anything and what a great news aggregator it was! I followed a lot of marketing experts and spent a lot of time clicking on the links they shared as they led to really interesting articles. I can t remember the last time I went to Google looking for marketing articles because twitter serves up all the very latest stuff straight to my stream! 3. Follow the people your people are following Confused? All this means is, check out who your tweeps (twitter peeps) are following, or having conversations with and then follow them too. The best thing about doing this is that you ll start to get a handle on how the twitter conversation works because you ll see whole conversations come up in your stream, rather than just one side. 4. Observe some more The more people you follow, the more overwhelming your stream may get but persist. And feel free to be brutal if someone in your stream is driving you nuts, then unfollow them. While you are observing, take note of who you like most on twitter and what kind of stuff they tweet. Chances are you will like the people who tweet stuff that is interesting to YOU and very little stuff about themselves. This is the major secret of twitter and every social network the people who are most useful to others are the most popular.
Resource sheet: Twitter for newbies cont // 5. Join in the conversation Once you ve reached some kind of comfort level on twitter, you can join in a conversation. The easiest way to do this is if someone asks a question and you have the answer. You can reply to them and sometimes (not all the time) they will reply back (their reply will appear in your stream, but you can also check your @ Connect tab to see if you ve missed a reply). Another way to start a conversation is to tell someone you liked the info in a link they ve shared. A really simple thanks for that article, it was really interesting is nice and let s that person know you appreciate the things they are sharing. 6. See if you can connect with other newbies When I first stumbled across all the Aussie bloggers on twitter it felt a little bit like high school to me it looked like a lot of people clamouring for the attention of those few that were the in-crowd, and it was hard not to get sucked into clamouring myself. Somehow I managed to connect with my own little newbie crowd and it was nice to know that if I engaged them in conversation, they would be sure to answer back. 7. Start to share Once you re comfortable on twitter you can start to share stuff yourself. I can t stress this enough BE USEFUL. I am a writer. I follow and am followed by a lot of fellow writers. If I come across a great article on writing, I share it because I know my writer tweeps are going to like it. Sharing great stuff is what opens the doors for other people to start conversations with you. The sort of final word As I mentioned at the top of this piece twitter is my absolute favourite social media place to hang out bar none. I have made wonderful new friends there and it has allowed me to connect with lots of people who share similar interests to me people I simply would never come into contact with otherwise. It has also allowed me to connect with thought leaders in my industry and once again, this is just not something I d be able to do in the real world.
YOUR EMAIL MARKETING QUESTIONS ANSWERED WHY DO YOU WANT AN EMAIL LIST? There are many reasons but the biggest one is that people can t ignore their email. They can ignore ads on tv. They can ignore you on facebook. They probably don t even see the flashing banners on news sites any more. But everyone reads their emails. So when people invite you into their inbox (by signing up for your email newsletter) this is both a huge privilege and a huge opportunity for you with regard to marketing your business to them. HOW DO YOU CREATE AN EMAIL LIST? Programs such as Mail Chimp or icontact allow you to create an email list quickly, easily and cheaply. The benefit of using these programs are: They are free up to a certain number of subscribers They allow you to send emails to hundreds or thousands of people at a time (which is not something you can do through Outlook or whatever your regular email program is). They allow people to unsubscribe themselves from the list without you having to do anything. They allow people to subscribe themselves TO your list via a form on your website. They allow you to set up a nicely branded design HOW DO YOU GET PEOPLE TO SIGN UP FOR YOUR EMAIL LIST? Well the first thing you do is add all your clients to your email list. They are already your clients so it completely valid to market to them directly (which is what email marketing is). If you clients don t want to be marketed to, they can remove themselves from your list themselves. The second thing to do is to attract non-clients and interested parties to sign up to your list. Now the days are long gone where you can put Sign up to our newsletter here in the sidebar of your website and expect anyone to actually do so. No if someone is going to give you direct access to their inbox, they want something in return. Which means you need to give them something tangible in exchange for their email. The best way to do this is to create a free and highly informative resource. This resource: Allows you to demonstrate your expertise Should be easy to pull together especially if you have a blog Gives the person signing up to your list something really useful and tangible which makes them think very nice things about you.
YOUR EMAIL MARKETING QUESTIONS ANSWERED //cont Some examples of what I mean Podiatrist: E-paper titled The 5 things you can do right now to avoid running injuries Dietitian: E-paper titled The 5 Diet foods that are stopping you from losing weight Graphic Designer: E-paper titled 3 things you can do to save money on every graphic design job Website Designer: E-paper titled The fool proof web design brief that will get you an accurate quote every time What do all of these resources have in common? They have compelling titles They address common pain points of the prospective clients for the various businesses They are e-papers so short and sweet (in other words, both easy to read/process for the receiver AND easy to pull together for the creator.)