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Archive for Business Blogging

Do You Read Your Own Content?

By Bridget Skinner · Comments (1)
Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011

Let me introduce my newest contributor and Assisting Writer, Bridget Skinner. She’s been playing a significant role behind the scenes while my company grows to accommodate  new clients. I know you’ll appreciate the insightful perspective she shares on some blogging basics in this post. ~Susan

Parachuting with an American flag at the EAA, AirVenture 2011.A quality piece of content work takes quality time. You might think you have all the right content ready to go – and maybe you do, maybe it is. Don’t hit that “Publish” button before you’ve let your piece sit for at least 24 hours. This piece of advice has been instrumental to me in the world of writing content. I can guarantee that when you pick it back up you’ll find changes that need to be made, every time.

Frustration comes easy when you think you have it all together, but something doesn’t seem to fit. If it doesn’t seem to fit after your first draft then let it sit! It will most likely be a difficult read to your audience if it’s difficult to you.

What do you offer that helps your reader?
Writing content for your business is more than just writing for you. To be the business that your client needs, you’ll need to look through their eyes for the best perspective when you’re writing. Get to know what will be helpful to your reader before you publish anything.

Then read and re-read your work again – making sure you’re capturing the client’s attention. Does it make sense? If not, try again. Article quality will be improved by the time you spend away from your original copy. When you pick it back up, the changes needed will be right in front of your face.

Will your reader follow the train of thought?
Subject matter is important, but so is keeping their eyes on the page. You want to review the length of your sentences. Are you being too wordy? Can your run-on sentence be made into two sentences? Can you get rid of some content altogether and avoid saying the same thing twice?

Titles don’t come easy, and if I can grab your attention with an exceptional title then I want to keep your attention with an exceptional article. In order to do this I need to read what I am writing out loud, and reading it once is just not enough. I might need to read it over a few times. After I’ve cleaned up any grammar and punctuation changes, it’s ready to go! Practice this yourself and watch your posts improve.

Don’t get frustrated with a blog that isn’t getting noticed. Figuring out how to write to your audience can be tricky when you’re just starting out. A little extra time put into detail will really make the difference.

Do you have trouble writing your blog posts? Tell us what you’re doing to improve your content in the comments section below.

Sign up for the Richardson Copywriter to get these posts sent straight to you. You’ll be a better writer in no time at all.

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Categories : Business Blogging
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How to Write an Excellent Blog Post

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (0)
Friday, July 8th, 2011

Have you ever read a blog that really tripped your trigger?

Eagles wings by Images by Hawkeye.It’s different with a blog than with chapters in a book or even articles from a magazine. Becoming really involved with what you’re reading in short form – to the point that you’d follow links for even more information or share the post using social media – well, that takes a bird’s eye perspective from the author.

Inspiring your audience to be enlightened, validated, or maybe even informed requires writing engaging material on your subject matter and remembering to add several ‘secret ingredients’ that will make your post excellent.

The secret ingredients may or may not surprise you, but they’re necessary for your audience to:

  • find your blog,
  • actually read it,
  • share it, and
  • respond to it.

After all, that’s the point, right? Your expert FREE opinion on something masterful and helpful will encourages the sale of your products and services, so do your best.

I’m going to give you 20 ways to make sure your blog post is excellent, and I won’t charge you a thing.

  1. Write for humans (not search engines) using keywords or phrases in your title and intro sentence. Write conversationally. Pretend someone is in front of you.
  2. Link your post to others on your site that support it, and to landing pages.
  3. Use anchor text in those links, appropriately matching phrases to keywords used in the page you’re linking to. Make it easy for your reader to navigate.
  4. Use pictures or images within each post. Studies show eyes will stay on the page longer.
  5. A blog can be a video, and your anchor text link can be below in a sentence or paragraph.
  6. Write in short paragraphs because we tend to scan, rather than read long blocks of text.
  7. Delete and replace all smart quotes to eliminate useless characters showing up in your newsletter subject lines when your post is published for RSS.
  8. Spend more time on your title than the post. You want it to grab the reader’s attention.
  9. Take the time to upload your picture or image correctly from your computer. Yes, you can hot-link it to a URL, but next week that picture may no longer exist in that location, and all you’ll be left with is an empty box.
  10. Give your picture or image a relevant title and capitalize the first letters. It’s a title.
  11. Use image alt text in sentence format, beginning with a capital and ending with a period. This is respectful of the blind community using electronic readers, and it’s also good SEO.
  12. Use as many tags as you can, and choose one category.
  13. Let your original post sit at least 24 hours and re-read before posting. Trust me.
  14. Read it out loud. Change anything you stumble over. Delete the unnecessary.
  15. If your images were originally found online, make sure they’re commercially licensed and give a photo credit link at the bottom of your post directly to the photographer’s photo stream.
  16. Make your call to action clear, matter-of-fact, but friendly. Tell your audience exactly what you want them to do.
  17. Use social media sharing buttons, like AddThis.
  18. Go tweet yourself. Seriously. Tweet about four times the first day your post is published, then back down.
  19. Don’t be afraid to have a differing opinion from others. Don’t be rude, but controversy to some degree inspires conversation.
  20. Don’t be concerned that you’ll lose business to another company if you link to a related business within your text. Link to those who really add interesting detail to your material. Your readers will love that you made it easy for them, and the object of your link will likely return the affection. Once again, link.

On a side-note, when you meet others at networking functions and acquire someone’s business card, visit their website and view their blog. You may see that a linking relationship exists that would benefit your website. It will be easy to approach them since you’ve met, right?

Now you have no excuse, go write excellent blog posts with confidence! Do you have something to add to my list? Share, I love it.

Related Posts:

Online Copywriting: Stick to The Main Thing

6 Ways to Love Your Business Blog

How to Write With ‘Flow’

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Categories : Business Blogging
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Flies Swarm To Honey And S***

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (0)
Thursday, May 26th, 2011

- Have an Opinion Already

Human flies.Convincing copy or other content isn’t always PC (politically correct). In a world of ever-changing sparkly things among the laboriously mundane, sometimes you just have to get your point across in ways that might make you hesitate.

If you’re a business owner, you have a strong opinion. It’s what it took to fire you up when you decided to do this thing. Don’t lay down now, accepting everything you hear.

You do feel very specifically different about something fairly often. Most of us do – I don’t even have to know you to know that’s true. How you relate that perspective has a lot to do with how conversational and approachable you are. It’s a lot like copywriting. And a WHOLE lot like blogging.

I’m just gonna say it, risk-takers win.

Finding something ordinary and lame to say is tedious for you and dull for your reader. I don’t really care if you agree with me or not – what I really want you to do, as a marketing copywriter, is react.

If you’re doing more than a passive job with your website, that’s what you want, too. That may take some honey, but it just might take something else. You don’t have to agree with everybody, in fact, you may be more inspiring if you don’t.

I don’t believe in using vulgarity to get attention, personally. Yeah, I’ve seen it work (who hasn’t?), but I’m not comfortable presenting myself like that sans martini. What I am saying, however, is that the nitty-gritty side of your story or message might be the most  compelling.

Don’t be overly convinced that you might be shunned or scorned for your very pointed opinion. Instead, use it to your advantage to electrify and stir up your possibly very bored audience.

Here are a few ideas to get you going:

  • How do you feel about the pricing in your industry?
  • Do you agree with mass media’s economic predictions?
  • Could you manage a task better if better methods were in place?
  • Do you think things naturally change, are impeded from changing for the better, or change too quickly with little forethought?

Go ahead, have an opinion! Remember to construct your sentences well and check your spelling. If you write your perspective to post on your blog, add a picture and don’t forget to link to corresponding  posts.

Then publish it and share it with us. When you leave your comments, our CommentLuv plugin pulls in your last post with a link that lets others see it.

Feels good, right?

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Categories : Business Blogging

6 Ways To Love Your Business Blog

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (3)
Thursday, April 7th, 2011

Love your business blog and it will love you back. Content is smart advertising, letting your visitors know you know how they feel and what they need.

Don’t use all that wonderful knowledge you’ve accumulated over the years to hit them over the head with information about your company. Instead, focus on how you’re willing to serve their needs.

Love your blog.Now that you know what not to do, here are 6 ways you can love your blog:

  1. Post at least weekly.
  2. Add sharing buttons, like AddThis.
  3. Request comments from your offline customers and online visitors.
  4. Respond to their comments.
  5. Use your Google Analytics to find out what your visitors look at, and deliver more.
  6. Post your actual blog post – the one they can comment on, not the category page list of posts – to your Facebook business page and social media groups that you (hopefully) participate in.

So go love your blog, and it will love you back with more traffic to your website and more business to your company.

BTW, when you leave me a comment, your last blog post is pulled in for others to read, giving you a nice back link (IF you’re not spam!). I love to hear how you use your blog for better business.

Photo Credit: Billy Alexander at stock.xchng.com

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Categories : Business Blogging

Business Blogging For Newbies

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (2)
Tuesday, April 5th, 2011

Learn to blog.Business blogging is pretty simple. Type some words into the little blog box and hit publish, right?

That may not be quite right …

Listen, a little understanding of basic HTML is really important when you want your expertise to show through. Poorly posted content risks being overlooked, or discredited. It doesn’t matter if you sell advice, perfume, pool services or recipes – you need to look like you know what you’re doing.

Here’s my two cents. I suggest learning some basic skills that will make your life much easier.  Plan to tackle one skill at a time until you have an understanding of it, and then go on to the next.

Good blog platforms will let you save your draft so you can come back to it with your new skills before you publish.

I also suggest creating 5 posts covering different topics of interest on your blog, and saving them to draft. Then publish the first five when you introduce your blog to the world. You’ll have a better chance of being taken seriously with those tasks accomplished.

Here’s my list of things to know, and links to where you can learn this important information before you begin your foray into business blogging:

I also recommend that you’re familiar with the subject matter so your efforts won’t be for naught!

Did I miss anything? I love to hear from you, leave me a comment below.

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Categories : Business Blogging
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How Do You Stay Focused?

By Shari Voigt · Comments (1)
Monday, January 10th, 2011

I hope you’re off to a super-productive new year! The following is the first guest post from my colleague, mentor and sister, Shari Voigt, marketing director for our team collaborative Zero To Sixty Marketing LLC. Look forward to many more insightful posts from Shari soon.

Checkered flag.Every successful entrepreneur quickly learns that busyness is easily confused with productivity. But they’re not the same thing – not by a long shot.

For me, productivity means that I’m producing something billable, working on a website marketing strategy, developing a product, or brainstorming with a client or team member. Busyness is all the stuff that wants to happen in between. I’m sure you’ll agree – there’s a lot of ‘stuff’ we can all easily get caught up in. Most of it does nothing to move our businesses forward.

So how do you stay focused on the important, and keep those ‘busy’ distractions to a minimum?

Start With a Task List

The tried and true task list is a good place to start. Just don’t make today’s task list a mile long. What are two or three things that MUST be accomplished today?

Use a Timer

I have a countdown timer on my Android and it’s in use constantly. Before that, I used a simple kitchen timer. I use it to limit the time I spend writing blog posts – 10 minutes to free write, 10 minutes to polish, 10 minutes to fuel up for the next blog post. Thanks to Ed Dale for that tip. Works like a charm.

Also use the timer to limit time spent on Twitter and Facebook. I need to follow my own advice here, but 10 minutes in the morning and another 10 minutes at the end of the day is enough to make a difference.

One hour chunks of time work best for client work and product development. Set the timer, turn off all distractions, and close your office door if necessary. It’s the opposite of multi-tasking, and much more effective if the goal is to improve your productivity.

How do you stay focused? Please share your best tips and tools in the comments below:

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Categories : Business Blogging
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How Often Should Your Business be Blogging?

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (8)
Thursday, August 26th, 2010

So you started this blog thing and it was real fun at first, but now finding things to write about is grueling – not even looking necessary since no one even noticed your attempts. You read about how important it is, but don’t really get it. If it helps your business, you’re willing to try, but man, what is the absolute minimum frequency you should post to start getting some feedback from your online readers?

Good question. Painted turtle.

You’ll hear every answer from daily to bi-weekly to monthly. And the truth is, if you have something valuable to another set of eyes, all of those answers will help you. Why? Because new content on your site is good for your business because it will ultimately boost your online reputation.

If you get burned out trying to crank new information out too frequently though, no doubt you’ll sound like it. And no one wants to read that. What you want to do is post content that others will find helpful. It’s a time-consuming endeavor that could take up to three months before you start getting responses.

Even then, they may not be the responses you want, at first.

Why Does Blogging Frequency Matter?

Each business has a different type of information to share. Ideally, posting relevant information daily with the right keyword usage while developing back links to your website – is a good thing. But it’s also a tall order, and you shouldn’t be discouraged by that kind of pressure. You also run a business.

The more frequently you post, the more your readers and customers get to learn about you. As they learn about you and enjoy what you’re writing, they will return. The more frequently they return, the more Google spiders become interested in the activity. As your readers leave reviews, your site will develop back links. If you cultivate your own back link strategy as well, you’ll pay attention to the wording you use when you link. All of these things stem from regular posting, and play a part in where your site ends up on a Google search page. If you’re not on the first page, you don’t exist.

When was the last time you went to the second page to look for something?

Exactly.

What’s a Small Business to do?

My suggestion is to take advantage of inspiration and shoot for the moon. Go ahead and write those posts and keep them in a handy place, like Google Docs. Then give yourself a reasonable blogging schedule, and make a commitment to post new material twice a week. If you have a WordPress blog, you can schedule those posts to go out regularly, and when you get down to a reservoir of one or two left, get yourself re-inspired and fill up your pool.

Posting daily is great if you can keep it up, but like I said, it’s a tall order. I like to under promise and over deliver, don’t you? If you can keep up a dynamic schedule like that, and promote your blog and business at the same time, great. You’ll notice that I only promise to post once a week on The Richardson Copywriter. Once and a while, I get a couple up. I write for so many blogs and ghost write for so many others that I have to be realistic. Blogging isn’t my bread and butter. I have to think about the other things that also pay my bills. Quite frankly, like you, I like the other aspects of my business even more than I like to blog!

I hope this helps you keep things in perspective. Go for the gold, and then refine your objectives and do the best you can. That isn’t a disclaimer! The best you can do is still A LOT. At the end of the day, you’ll never regret doing what needs to be done. We all regret what we don’t.

Let us know about your blogging schedule, we love to hear from you. When you leave a comment, my CommentLuv plugin pulls your latest post into your comment, leaving a back link that will increase in value as my blog ages and grows.

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Categories : Business Blogging
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Grammatically Speaking: Tips to Remember When Blogging

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (0)
Wednesday, August 18th, 2010

Your blog isn’t under the same scrutiny as your other, more direct marketing methods. A blog is more of a place where your readers and potential customers can learn more about you before they purchase, as well as interact with you after the sale. A blog is designed for two-way communication, and that means it should be written more conversationally than articles, for example.

Woman proud of her blogging.That being said, we can’t just post garbage and expect a decent reputation. Basic rules still hold true. If you want your business to be taken seriously, you’ll have to spend a little time making sure you don’t appear to be an unlearned, unskilled individual that couldn’t have much to offer. All it takes is a little – and I do mean a little – common knowledge, reference material, and proofreading. If in doubt that a sentence reads correctly, wait a day and read it out loud. Errors in grammar are often found there.

If you don’t care, your readers will notice. It’s almost a respect issue. If you have problems in this area, hire someone to help you write or edit. Don’t neglect this detail.

Here are a few things to check before you post:

  • Never use could of, would of, or should of. The second word in each pair may sound like “of” conversationally, but it should always read “have.”
  • Referring to yourself as ‘I’ is not always correct, although it can sound right. Read the sentence aloud, “Steve and I want ice cream.” If it can be read “I want ice cream.” you’ve used it as it should be. If you say, “That really bothered Steve and I” it would be wrong because you wouldn’t say, “That really bothered I.” Instead, “That really bothered Steve and me,” or “me and Steve” while sounding wrong, is actually proper because you can say, “That really bothered me.”
  • Make sure you use actual words, and not made up words that have simply been used by your family for generations, unless you point that out for humor! You can’t assume that your readers know you’re not an idiot. When in doubt, look it up.

Readers will forgive occasional, tiny grammatical errors. It isn’t the end of the world if you realize after posting that you’ve made a mistake. If you do, simply comment on your own blog about noticing your blunder and let it go.

Do you have any pet peeves when it comes to grammar? What are they, we’d love to hear about them!

Related Articles:

Three Things That Don’t Work

Are You Paying for Great Content?

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Does Time Prevent You From Blogging About Your Small Business?

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (2)
Thursday, August 12th, 2010

Quite a few of my Twitter followers post about time management and productivity. For those of us who are marketing ourselves online, we’ve had to learn a bit about the value of the online minute. For those of you who can’t find the time to blog, I have some ideas that may help.
Man freaked out about blogging

5 Steps to Writing Your Business Blog

  1. Make a list of topics you can write about at the beginning of the week.
  2. Take an egg timer and using Word or Google Docs write one of your topics and the subsequent first sentence. Set your timer for 10 minutes.
  3. Write everything you know about this topic until the timer stops.
  4. Pick another topic, and repeat.
  5. Do not edit for at least 24 hrs. (Per Ed Dale, but Shari Voigt allows two days)

Seriously, you may have some real crap. Don’t let that scare you. After 24 hours have passed, take a look at your first document. You will easily be able to see what needs to be done to say what you need to say.

Only after that should you incorporate keywords into your work. You should be keeping a running list of the keywords you’ve researched (Market Samurai is excellent for this) and appropriately add them to your text. Spend a little time sculpting your sentences so you come across conversational and informed. Don’t “stuff” your keywords, they’ll only sound ridiculous. If your keywords don’t flow naturally with the text, it is better to ditch them than put off your readers by forgetting that you want human interaction. You’re writing for them, after all.

Your blog post doesn’t need to be long, a couple of paragraphs are fine. While I believe that grammar is significant in your web copy and marketing materials, blogging gives you a little more room to be ‘you.’ Just in case you need a refresher, however, Copyblogger reminds us that common errors are easy to make, but just as easy to fix. Read more from Brian Clark at Copyblogger.

What grammatical mistakes do you commonly make? Do they prevent you from taking the time to blog? What keeps you from blogging more frequently?

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Categories : Business Blogging
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Free Writing: It’s all in the Edit, Not the Composition

By Susan Hamilton · Comments (2)
Friday, July 30th, 2010

I want to talk to you about a content writing technique called free writing. Genius really, but completely opposite of what’s been taught in high schools throughout history. The closest thing I’ve seen to it so far is the process of journaling. Even then, however, we have a tendency to edit while we write as opposed to simply writing for a period of time and editing after another set period has gone by, usually a day. Writing, you see, and editing, are done in two different parts of the brain. You’ll become a much better writer when you separate the functions of writing and editing, instead of combining them at one sitting.zipline fun

The concept is that our brains become accustomed to the routines we’ve established. We know that’s true because of habits like addictions, exercise, and various other things we try to improve upon, only to realize that the mental aspect of what we’re changing is even harder than the physical aspect. Sooner or later we realize that we won’t really change anything about our behaviors without using a replacement value.

For instance, to stop smoking you must do more than just stop. Stopping requires consciously developing negative thoughts towards smoking, but also a replacement physical behavior that helps us relearn an alternative to smoking.

Free writing is actually the same concept. Instead of writing and editing your text as you write and as we’ve been taught, write freely on a topic for a 10 minute session. The time frame is crucial, the gobbledy-gook that you’ll write, is not. No matter what you come up with, even if it’s only “I’m writing for ten minutes and I will not stop until the timer goes off” over and over again, stick with it. Using a timer will help you stay the ten minute course without interruption. This process will allow you to retrain your brain.

The brain needs to understand that you will physically do this regardless of the outcome. Amazing things happen when you decide to take authority over your thoughts through physical action. You want to do one thing, but instead, create an environment where you have to do another. Your writing improves when you let your thoughts ‘flow’ instead of editing them. Returning to edit after a day of letting your work rest helps you stay on point, and also allows you to come up with quite a bit more content on a subject than you ever realized you could.

Give it a shot! Tell me what you think about free writing techniques. Are you coming up with better content? Tell me about it below.

Learn more from online marketing strategist, Ed Dale, by following this You Tube video link here:

The Challenge 2010: Free Writing

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