Ghost Bloggers Can Major In The “Minors”

I love making presentations, and am always reading the latest tips in the field of professional speaking.  But even if public speaking is last on your list of favorite things to do, Speaker Magazine’s November issue has some very valuable advice for business owners. Mike Rayburn warns speakers to stop being so busy and to start achieving, explaining that the secret of super-productivity is not doing more; it is doing less!


Here’s the crux of what Rayburn tells business owners to do: “Identify what you are good at and what energizes you the most, and then do more of those tasks.”  By focusing your time, attention, and energy on your strengths, he teaches, you will see your business take off.


The topic of which tasks must be done by the business owner him/herself, and which can be delegated, comes up quite often when I’m discussing blogging for business. As I brought out in one of my very first Say It For You blogs (see Ghost Blogging Gets The Girl), many celebrities and public figures used, in fact still do use, professional ghost writers for one simple reason: Despite having subject matter knowledge and valuable opinions to share with fans, readers, clients, customers, or colleagues, these VIPs are not confident in their own writing abilities.


When it comes to business owners, it’s often true that, even if they are competent writers, and even if they understand the value of business blogging for “winning search” and attracting online traffic to their business website, blogging is not what energizes them.


For many business owners, blogging’s a “minor thing” and they simply don’t want to major in it! The thing is, though, blogging has come very far from being a minor thing.  Piper Jaffray reports that the Internet has surpassed print yellow pages and newspapers combined as the primary local resource for consumers looking for services!


Blogging’s simply become too important an aspect of business marketing to ignore.  Enter the ghost blogger, devoting time and energy to the “minor” things that can have such a major impact on business.
 

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedintumblrmail

Clear Glasses Are For Blogs

Professional speaker Todd Hunt sends me a humorous e-newsletter about workplace communications, called Hunt’s Headlines.  Hunt’s focus is language, and he speaks about how, too often, businesses use language in ways that confuse their clients instead of helping them.


Presenting for the first time in Tigard, Oregon, Hunt had dinner in a Sweet Tomatoes salad bar restaurant.  When you order a soft drink or milk at Sweet Tomatoes, he says, you get a clear glass to fill at the beverage station, but, if you order just water to drink, you’re given a blue glass. 


Hunt ordered just the water, and what amused him is that, along with his blue glass, he was given a card that read, “Our blue glasses are intended for water.  If you changed your mind and helped yourself to our Bottomless Beverage Bar, place this card at the end of your table.  Our staff will come by to ring you up.”


Always looking for simpler, saner, more customer-friendly ways to express ideas in business, Hunt suggests the following message: “Blue glasses are for water ONLY!  Other beverages cost!”


If ever there was a lesson for bloggers to be found at a beverage station, Todd Hunt’s served it up, I think. Like medical students training to be physicians who are admonished “Above all, do no harm!”, bloggers should remember the maxim, “Above all, create no confusion!” 


As I explained in From Meat To Mustard, when it comes to web-based communication, words, along with pictures, are a business’ only tools.  That, in fact, is what we professional ghost bloggers do for a living – work with words, turn phrases, look for the “Wow!” factor.  Above all, though, our job is to communicate what your business does for its clients and customers!.  Yes, indeed. Clear glasses are for blogs!



 



 

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedintumblrmail

Today, I Blog. Yesterday, I Blog. Tomorrow, I Blog.

The other day, I read something so interesting in Speaker Magazine! It’s about  how our English language is very different from Asian languages.  Since I’m a wordsmith (what else could you call a professional ghost blogger?), the ways in which different people use words, especially for doing business, is something I find fascinating.


The article was called “Writing for Global Audiences”, and the writer, Dr. Kathleen Begley, was advising professional speakers to be careful when communicating with people from other countries. She explained that English has twelve different tenses. As an example, she gave the following: “Today, I speak.  Yesterday, I spoke. I had spoken the day before yesterday.  Tomorrow, I will speak.”  And (an example of a tense called future perfect conditional), “By 3 PM, I will have been giving this speech for thirty minutes.”  Asian speakers, Begley explained, would use only one tense for all of these:  “Today I speak.  Yesterday, I speak.  Tomorrow, I speak. By 3 PM, I speak for 30 minutes.” 


A couple of things about the use of language in blogging come to mind.  I’m always mentioning that blog writing is much more informal and conversational than other forms of business writing.  But, as I tried to bring out in In Blogging, Keep The Love, But Lose The “Like”!, this is your business and your brand you’re putting out there with your blog.  You always want to be sure that poor grammar and misspelled words aren’t distracting readers and taking away from the impact of your message.  Granted, 99.99% of business bloggers (and of their blog readers, I might add) wouldn’t so much as recognize the existence of the future perfect conditional tense.  I’ll bet, though, a few might be put off by shoddy spelling and lesser-grade grammar. ,”The devil is in the details”, may be true of blogging for business, along with the one about “If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well.


Back to the subject of English language tenses..In blogging it’s important to maintain consistency and frequency, since both of these are measures search engines use in ranking your blog.  “I used to blog”, “I once was blogging”, or “I had been blogging but I’m not blogging now” – none of these are phrases likely to capture respect in online rankings.  To “win search”, you’ll need to be saying “Yesterday I blogged.  Today I blog.  Tomorrow I will blog, and, by next year, I will have been blogging for a year and half.”  By that time, you should be able to add, “And, I have been winning search!”

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedintumblrmail

Get Tammy Dancing With Elvis In Your Blog

As a professional ghost blogger, one of the pointers I always give business bloggers is to keep a sharp focus in each blog post.  In Your Blog’s No Swiss Army Knife, the point I tried to get across is that you don’t want your blog to be an all-in-one marketing tool.  You shouldn’t try to give searchers information about everything you have to offer, all in one blog post.  With each post, offer just a “peek”, enough to convey to the people browsing the Web they’ve come to the right spot. On the other hand, you want your blog to stand out, to be unusually interesting, so that readers will want to stay awhile and maybe even move on to your business’ website. 


The other day I read a review of a band that played at Daddy Jack’s on Halloween night, telling how this band was able to keep the crowd dancing and singing along.
The reviewer added something that I think is really good advice for business bloggers.  “It was especially fun,” he remarked, “to see Tammy dancing with Elvis, and a ladybug dancing with a monster.”   In other words, when you put two things together that don’t seem to match – that can be a good technique to capture people’s interest. Suggesting a totally new way of using your product or service, that may open up new possibilities for that potential customer to do business with you.


Picture the ladybug/monster couple dancing at Daddy Jack’s – it captures attention because those two characters don’t usually go together. Now, if I’m your ghost blogger, and if I can capture an Internet browser’s interest by showing useful – and unexpected – ways your company’s expertise or product line can be of help, you’ve got a good chance of converting a “Who knew?” browser into an  “I wanna know more!” online buyer!

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedintumblrmail

Not Always “Aha!” – Blogging Can Rhyme In Time

In “Creatively Mindful Gifts”, Ellen Michel, outreach manager for Bloomingfoods Market and Deli, had some interesting things to say about gift giving during the upcoming holiday season.


As a professional ghost blogger, I’m always on the alert for “tidbits” that capture big concepts using very few words. In her article, Michel remarked that “We don’t have to make everything new at a time when people take greater pleasure in basking in memories.”  She mentioned the “rhyme in time” effect that gives us a chance to repeat and recall time-honored rituals during the holidays.


In an earlier Say It For You blog (see Aha, Aha! Right Rope For Your Blog) I’d mentioned that your business blog should be designed to elicit an “Aha!” response. I pointed out that your potential customer is searching online for a product, for service, or for information, and that he or she’s moving fast.  You’re hoping that your blog can cause a “light to pop on”, so that the Internet browser will want to stay on the blog long enough find out more about you and your business.


There’s another aspect to gaining a blog following, though.  Often, once searchers find valuable, relevant, and well-written information in a blog on a topic of interest to them (which is how they came to make their way to your blog in the first place!), they’re likely to come back for more.  Even if some visitors are not prepared to make a purchase decision today, they may well come back to visit as regular blog “fans” That’s where your blog’s “rhyme in time” effect can kick in, offering fans a space to feel at home and to enjoy sharing – and, yes, repeating – information about the things that interest you both.

Facebooktwitterredditlinkedintumblrmail