Not That “We”, This “We” in Blogging for Business

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In using the pronoun “we” in blog posts, I asserted in a recent newsletter, we keep the blog conversational rather than academic-sounding or overly sales-ey. That isn’t pompous, I wrote – “it just works”. My point was that in conversing with readers through blog content writing, using “we” calls attention to the real people behind the company or practice brand.

One thing for sure is that not everyone agrees. “Cut the word ‘we’ wherever you possibly can,” Joanna Wiebe advises in copyhackers.com, That should apply even to “About Us” page, she says. Why? Your visitors don’t want to hear about you. They want to hear about themselves – about their problems, their needs, their futures.

In a survey by Corporate Visions, more than 47% of respondents said they use we-phrasing deliberately to position themselves as trusted partners. On the other hand, the survey revealed, the audience felt much more strongly that they must take action when you-phrasing was done rather than we-phrasing. Meanwhile, a set of experiments by the Journal of Consumer Research examined messages from banks and a health insurer, concluding that the pronoun “we” doesn’t work if it’s inconsistent with the actual relationship. In other words, if customers don’t expect a congenial relationship with a particular type of company, “we” arouses suspicion. True, existing customers responded favorably to the “we” verbiage.

All this research made we realize that I had been thinking of one type of “we”, while these other articles were referencing another. I like to use the word “we” to refer to the people owning the company or professional practice. The real people behind the “we” pronoun are taking ownership of their opinions and of the particular ways in which they choose to serve their customers. I was not recommending the use of the “we” to mean we-the-owners-and-you-the-customers, in a very fakey and patronizing “Let’s-try-on-these-shoes-shall-we?” way. The “we” to which I was referring describes the business owners/practitioners as the writers of the blog, with the readers remaining the “you”.

Business owners and professionals are the “we” with the ideas, knowledge and experience to share. The online visitors are the “you” receiving the good advice and the answers to their questions.

 

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Putting Questions in Readers’ Mouths

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Putting words into someone’s mouth is generally a bad thing, merriam-webster.com explains, because it suggests that person said or meant something that he or she did not actually say or mean. When it comes to blog marketing, though, putting questions into someone’s mind might be a very good thing for all concerned, we’ve discovered at Say It For You. In Writer’s Digest, Peter Mountford encourages writers to “make your character explicitly ask for the the thing they want.” That’s because, Mountford asserts, a request creates an explicit, as-yet-unfulfilled desire, in turn creating tension (and therefore interest).Instead of having the protagonist’s sister say “Hey, why don’t you borrow my car?”, have Sarah urgently ask to borrow the car for an urgent errand – despite her history of car accidents.

Questions are central to blog marketing strategy. As Team Kapost of uplandsoftware.com writes, “Questions create intrigue, serving as an invitation to participate in a conversation”. At Say It For You, we’ve certainly found this to be true. Keeping in mind that people are online searching for answers to questions they have and for solutions for dilemmas they’re facing, it’s also true that searchers haven’t always formulated their questions. What I suggest, therefore, is that we do that for them. After all, we’re out to engage our blog readers and show them we understand the dilemmas they’re facing.

What’s more, sales trainers often stress that being able to ask questions satisfies prospects’ need to control the situation. So if we as blog writers can go right to the heart of any possible customer fears or concerns by addressing negative assumption questions (before they’ve even been asked!),  we have the potential to breed understanding and trust.

As business blog content writers, we need to impress readers even before they’ve had the chance to ask us their questions. While those readers are online because they’re searching for answers to questions they have and for solutions for dilemmas they’re facing. I really believe that blog writing for business will succeed only if two things are apparent to readers, and in the order presented here:

  1. You (the business owner or professional practitioner) understand their concerns and needs.
  2. You and your staff have the experience, the information, the products, and the services to solve exactly those problems and meet precisely those needs.For blogs to be effective, they must serve as positioning statements. The “visit” has to conclude with readers understanding exactly what your particular philosophy or mission is. Even though the encounter is taking place online, prospects are always mentally posing the “What’s In It For Me?” question. What’s the benefit in this for ME? How will MY interests be protected and served if I choose to do business with you or become your client or patient? What will you do to keep ME “safe” from risk?

So, by all means, go ahead and put questions into your blog readers’ mouths!

 

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Telling Them What It Means

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I always enjoy receiving my copy of The Zulu Group’s Home News from realtor friend Steve Rupp. This month, I thought the article “What Does that Mean” would have particular relevance for blog content writers The following three explanations were taken from Jeff Rovin’s book The Unbelievable Truth,,,

  • Pulling the wool over someone’s eyes…In earlier times, thieves would yank their victims’ wool wigs over their eyes, so that the victims couldn’t identify the perpetrators.
  • Blackmail… In 16th century England the word mail meant “rent”. Debts that had to be paid in silver were called whitemail; those that could be paid in livestock or other property were “blackmail”. Since blackmail had no ascertainable value, debt collectors could extort any amount they chose from the debtors.
  • Red tape…It was the custom, in England, to seal important documents with red wax and tape. The only way to read those documents was by cutting the tape.

Interesting….almost exactly ten years ago, I published a Say It For You blog post called “Which Means That” Business Blogging. Al Trestrail, a networking colleague of mine at the time had just produced a brochure offering marketing tips. Trestrail suggested to salespeople that they should develop a list of benefits, and then, after each item, add the words “which means that….”, going on to explain how that benefit helped the buyer of the product or service. Adapting that rule to the world of blogging means answering your readers’ question “so what?” before it’s even asked, I realized.

We’ve all heard it – buyers care about benefits, not features. Content writers need reminding – there are millions of blog posts out there making claims of one sort or another.  But what do those claims mean to the customers and clients reading that blog post? It’s true for both existing customers and clients and the new ones we’re seeking to win over – to win hearts and dollars, you need a strategy in place to demonstrate “what it means”, which might include describing how your “it” is: rarer easier to use, safer, more compact, more water-resistant, more beautiful, greener, or fresher.

A big part of blogging is simply telling them what it means!

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Putting Price Into Perspective

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Boy, those Harvard Business Review guys sure know how to put things into perspective… I learned that minimum wage employees in Venezuela would need to work 7,063 hours (in other words, more than three years) to buy an iPhone 13. (Here in good ole’ USA, you’d need to work a mere 114 hours to afford that phone.). Customers in every industry are price-sensitive, but, as Allstate found when it comes to auto insurance, it’s simply not true that most will buy the least expensive plan they can find. Price for the value you create, advises Dave Gray, author of Gamestorming: a Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. In fact, the Corporate Finance Institute defines value-based pricing as adjusting the price based on perceived value rather than historical price.

At Say It For You, we perceive our primary task as blog content writers to be this – clearly demonstrating the value delivered by a business or practice to its customers and clients. By doing that, we have the power to put the price of those goods and services into perspective.

Karen Greenstreet, writing in Forbes in 2014, offered reasons you should – and reasons you shouldn’t – put pricing on your website or in your blog.  You want the chance to establish rapport before discussing pricing, she acknowledges, but many customers will not do business with a company that is not forthcoming about pricing and fees.

My own take as a blog writer and trainer is that the very purpose of blogs is to put information into perspective for visitors. The typical website explains what products and services the company offers, who the “players” are and in what geographical area they operate; the better ones give visitors at least a taste of the corporate culture and some of the owners’ core beliefs.  It’s left to the continuously renewed business blog writing, though, to “flesh out” the intangibles, those things that make a company stand out from its peers.

For every fact about the company or about one of its products or services, a blog post addresses unspoken questions such as “So, is that different?”, “So, is that good for me?”  It’s not that pricing isn’t important or that it should be left out –  it’s simply one of many things readers are going to consider.

I think about putting price into perspective not only in terms of my blogging clients’ customers, but in terms of their own budget as we begin a blog marketing initiative.. Often it’s a small business owner in a retail or services field competing with giant national chains. With fewer dollars available, the little guy cannot hope to compete in purchasing ads and needs to rely on organic search to attract eyeballs.  In other words, my clients are wondering, what are their chances for success when they find themselves playing with fewer “game pieces” than their larger, better funded, competitors?

That is where blog value comes in – with consistency and commitment, they have every chance of demonstrating the value they offer, putting the price of their goods and services into proper perspective.

 

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Post-It Note Blogging For Business

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Several years ago, while serving as an English tutor at Ivy Tech Community College, I created a writing guide for my students, urging them to complete the first three steps before sitting down at their laptops to write an assigned essay. They were to use Post-It® Notes to jot down ideas. That way, the order of the different paragraphs could be switched around. Blog content writers can follow an identical process in organizing their thoughts…

Step One: Select your topic. (Hint: Your TOPIC is not necessarily the same as the title for the post. Your topic is also not the same as your thesis statement. Your topic IS the answer to the question I might ask a person who’s just finished reading your blog post: “So…what was the subject of that piece?

Step Two: Compose your thesis statement. Another way to think of your thesis statement is your “one-sentence speech”. The thesis statement tells the reader what your particular “slant” is on the topic. Are you out to explain how to use a product or service? Are you intent on raising awareness of a problem you know how to solve? Are you aiming to demonstrate your involvement in your community?

Step Three: the three-legged stool
Just as a stool will not stand firmly without having at least three legs, you should plan to have three “legs”, or points to use in proving your thesis.

Step Four: Support your points
This is where students would find statistics, or articles by authorities who have opinions that support their ideas. (Even in this digital age, I used to advise students to print out pages they were going to quote, so that they could highlight specific passages they might cite.) On a Post-It®, which they’d affix to the page, they’d capture the information needed to cite that source on their References or Works Cited page).

Step Five: Outline your paper (or blog post)
With your tools now “lined up”, you are ready to decide in what order you’ll present the ideas. (This is where you experiment by moving the Post-It notes around). Once you’ve settled on the order, it will be easier to see which element is best for capturing attention at the start, as well as which makes for a powerful ending statement. This can also be the ideal time to select a title to arouse readers’ interest.

Try Post-It® blogging for business!

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