Putting Blog Readers in Possession of the Truth

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Blog content writing was unheard of when philosophers Aristotle and Confucious, or even John Locke, were alive, but it’s interesting how very apropos their sayings are today:

“The great art of learning is to understand but little at a time.” (Locke)
It’s easy to become overwhelmed, these days, by the sheet amount of information available to us on any given subject. Blogs offer information in bite-sized pieces. In creating bog content, we need to exercise “portion control” in the length of paragraphs, of blog titles and of entire blog posts, focusing on one central idea in each post.

“It is one thing to show a man that he is in error, and another to put him in possession of the truth.” (Locke)
I’m a firm believer that myth debunking is a great use for corporate blogs.  That’s because in the natural course of doing business, misunderstandings about a product or service often surface in the form of customer questions and comments. Addressing misinformation in a company’s blog shines light on the owner’s special expertise, besides offering information that is valuable to readers. De-mystifying matters can make your blog into a “go-to” source for readers seeking information in your field. On the other hand, people generally don’t like to have their assertions and assumptions challenged, so even as you’re debunking, do it in a way that respects readers’ desire for new, little-know information.

“Even while they teach, men learn.” (Seneca the Younger)
At Say It For You, I call this the “training benefit”, meaning that when you blog, you are constantly providing yourself with training about ways to talk effectively about your products and services.

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” (Aristotle)
Every time you write a blog post, it’s one more indexed page on your website, plus it’s a cue to the search engines that your website is active and they should be checking in frequently to see what content you’ve published.

“It does not matter how slowly you go, as long as you do not stop.” (Confucius)
Whether your blog posts are composed by you as the business owner or professional practitioner or by a content writer, the key is to continue to implement your plan until it becomes totally part of your new way of life and work.

 

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Laws of Likability for Bloggers

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In her rare downtime, Michelle Tillis Lederman confesses in her book The 11 laws of Likability, her guilty pleasure is watching TV reality shows. The characters she’s most drawn to, she realized, are being real. Contestants who accept themselves and have a sense of humor about their faults are the most likable, she concluded.

How does that insight apply to networking? Lederman asks. Being authentic is not a permission slip to be rude, obnoxious or inappropriate, but what it does mean is letting your true self show through so that others can connect with you, she concludes.

Can this insight be applied to online content marketing? In-person communication, Lederman explains, is based on three components – verbal (the words you choose), vocal (the tone and animation of your voice), and visual (facial expression and body language). In web-based marketing, we realize at Say It For You, words become our primary tools for transmitting the “true you” of our business owner or professional practitioner clients.

Lederman offers four pieces of practical advice about word-based communication:

  1. Start with the positive.
  2. Choose strong, actionable verbs.
  3. Focus on what can be done.
  4. Translate your own ideas into knowledge and opportunity (for them)

Nothing is more real – and more “likable”, our blog content writers have learned, than citing the real-life obstacles the business owner needed to overcome and the wisdom she’s gained in the process.

A connection is something that requires two, Lederman reminds readers. In the world of blog marketing, it is the visitors who’ve initiated the “conversation” by virtue of searching online for answers to a question they have or a product or service they are seeking. The blog content is there to do what Lederman calls “meeting them where they are – almost”. As bloggers, we’re validating the readers’ “energy state”, showing them we “heard” what they are saying and that they’ve come to the right place.

In relationships, Lederman realizes, when you give freely to others, you increase your likability. Still, you don’t always get something in return. A favor, she reminds readers, is only a favor when someone wants it!

In pull marketing (of which blogging is an important part, you have advice and valuable information to offer freely to all visitors to your site. Yet “what one person finds valuable may be another person’s spam,” the author remarks ruefully. Just be yourself and be there, she concludes. The rest is up to them.

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Blogging Lessons From the Courtroom

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‘The courtroom was his job, writes Trey Goudy in Doesn’t Hurt to Ask, but you, too, he tells readers, will need to successfully advocate about something or someone. You will be persuading others to either come closer to your way of thinking or at least see why it is you believe what you believe, he says.

Based on Goudy’s decades-long experience as a prosecutor, he has arrived at certain conclusions about what persuasion is not (debating or arguing) and what it is (incremental). Both conclusions relate directly to blog marketing, I couldn’t help thinking. Blogging is certainly incremental, delivering information on a topic over a series of different posts, all part of a longer, ongoing, messaging process.

You have your facts, Goudy says, as you’re preparing to persuade, with a sense of which are most compelling. You’ve prioritized them properly. You’ve thought through every point and have a plan for defending it. But only sometimes, he admits, is the objective knowable (such as a verdict or an election tally). In real life, persuasion is movement, and movement can be small at times. In fact, I mused, in blog content marketing, persuasion is meant to happen in small increments.

Think how they think, Goudy advises (he might well have been referring to blog readers as much as to a jury). What do you really know about what they think? he asks. You’ve spent time gathering all the relevant facts, but you need to have a clear sense of which group you are trying to move, persuade, or convince. .Then comes evaluating how heavy a “lift” you need. Remember, if you are resolute in your own mind, chances are good that the audience is resolute in theirs, he reminds us.

In a non-digital conversation, you can come across as agreeable and likeable by saying things such as “I understand where you are coming from.” In blog marketing, however, the printed words are your one tool to demonstrate that level of likability and openness. “Start with your consensual point,” the author advises, “not your most provocative one.”

In the arena of persuasion, traits to be desired include believability, likability, authenticity – and access to facts. In a courtroom, Goudy says, you want to “impeach” the statements made by the other side (the facts they rely on and the overarching principles or conclusion behind those facts, but not the people).

Since blog content writers’ tools are words, Goudy’s chapter on “Big Words, Soft Words” offers helpful concepts. Certain words, he says, are “simply too big to make for objective and precise communications”. One of those words is “always” (as in “You always interrupt me when I am speaking”). Virtual or no, discussions need to allow for respectful dialogue.

The final paragraph of the book might have been directed specifically towards blog content writers: “Go communicate what you believe and why you believe it in the most persuasive way possible.”

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Readers Remember Helpful Hints

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Sometimes a concept just keeps slapping you in the face with how true it is…. I’d been writing about offering helpful how-to hints as a way of engaging visitors to your blog. Find complementary businesses or practices, I advised, asking those business owners or practitioners for tips they can offer for you to pass along to your readers. The best tips and hints, I added, are related to some a topic currently trending in the news, especially one affecting your industry.

Just the other day, in the course of attending virtual networking meetings, I heard two wonderful examples of helpful hints.

First, fellow InfoConnect2 member Jim Badger (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimbadger/)  explained that, because COVID-19 has caused to many people to meet virtually rather than in person, the logo imprint on the apparel should be put on the collar or high up on the shoulder of the jacket or shirt, so that it will be visible within in the frameword of the Zoom image

  • Hours later, in a Happy Networking virtual room, Samuel Brown, CEO of PacketEx in South Carolina (https://www.linkedin.com/in/packetex/) offered a helpful tip about computers and cell phones. Should we turn those off every night? Yes, Brown explained. It’s not because the phone or PC or Mac needs to rest (those machines are made to run, he said.) Turning off the devices allows them to perform automated tasks, including combating viruses, he explained.
  • At Say It For You, we teach that everything about your blog should be tailor-made for your ideal customer’s needs and preferences. The content is there to raise readers’ awareness of solutions and to educate them about products or tactics they perhaps hadn’t considered. With all that having been said, how do you get your business or practice remembered?

Well, the “logo” has to be high enough on the garment so it gets seen on the Zoom image. The advice has to solve a real problem and be implementable.

Try jogging your blog visitors’ memories with your own “in the now”, “in the know”, trend-related, practical, helpful hints!.

 

 

 

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How to Hug Customers in Your Blog

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“It’s not location, location, location,’ Jack Mitchell writes in Hug Your Customers. “It’s service, service, service.” Sure, a decent location with reasonable traffic, convenient to get to, and more than adequate parking – will do just fine if you learn to ‘hug” your customers. Personalized attention to customers is the proven way to achieve sales results, is the thesis of Mitchell’s book, based on Mitchell’s Family of Stores’ clothing and jewelry business.

Since the first publication of his book, the author admits, much has changed, with the most significant of those changes being the growth of Internet sales for all industries. One thing that has not changed, Mitchell, claims, is the need to deliver personalized customer service. People still yearn for at least a smile and a thank-you from an actual human being, he says. Actually, people do more than merely yearn when it comes to personal service – research shows that customers are willing to pay more for a product if they receive better customer service during and after a purchase.

At our content marketing company, we absolutely agree. The challenge we blog content writers take on is translating those “smiles” and “thank-you’s” into digital messaging. As part of the business blogging assistance I offer through Say It For You, I’m always talking to business owners about their customer service.  The challenge is – EVERY business says it offers superior customer service! (Has any of us ever read an ad or a blog that does NOT tout its superior customer service?)  It’s not enough to say it – you have to specifically illustrate ways in which your company’s customer service exceeds the norm.

There’s more. Personalized service includes teaching customers new skills, and some blog posts can take the form of actually tutorials and step-by-step instructions. Stories of all kinds –help personalize a business blog. Even if a professional writer is composing the content, true-story material increases engagement by readers with the business or practice. Case studies are particularly effective in creating interest, because they are relatable and “real”.

In Journalism 101 class, we were taught to “put a face on the issue” by beginning the article with a human example  A case study takes that personalization even further, chronicling a customer or client who had a problem or need, and taking readers through the various stages of using the product or service to solve that problem. What were some of the issues that arose along the way? What new insights were gained through that experience, on the part of both the business and the customer?

You might not think of simplifying your website navigation as another way to “hug” customers, but it absolutely is. Marketing blogs are all about getting found,, but now they’ve found you, both both the content of your blog posts and the navigation paths on the blog site had better be easy, calling for fewer keystrokes and less confusion.

When writing content for your own blog or when planning content with the individuals you’ve hired for business blogging assistance, keep in mind that online readers might decide at any point that they’re ready to learn more, that they have a question to ask, or that they’re ready to take advantage of your products and services.  Make the process feel like a smile and and a hug!

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