Blog to Show Both Sides of an Issue

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  • two sides of an issue
    Are the oldest fossils really rocks?
    Is insomnia always dangerous?
    Is nervousness natural and healthy?
    Is eating potatoes as bad for teens as digital technology?

These are just a few of the debatable topics covered in recent issues of both Psychology Today and Prevention Guide. But whether the topic of your own blog marketing efforts is health or geology, the blog content itself, I teach at Say It For You, needs to use opinion to clarify what differentiates your business, your organization or professional practice from its peers.

Often, when I’m tutoring students at the Ivy Tech Learning Center, they will have been assigned
an “argument essay”. After selecting and researching a topic, the idea is that the students must present differing viewpoints, selecting the one they are out to “prove” is correct. Still, the finished essay must reflect both sides of the “argument”.

The same model holds true for business blog posts, I believe. It’s a good idea to offer perspective on different points of view when it comes to an issue within your industry or profession, explaining why you support one of the different possible approaches.

Last year, in fact, I titled one of my own blog posts “New Blogging Means Being Controversial”. The concept is that you can increase traffic and build engagement with controversial content, so long as your point of view is backed up with data – and, so long as you present arguments for both sides.

Of course, a big part of the “both sides” thing has to do with your target audience, I explain to blog content writers. More than ten years ago, I wrote about an article I’d read about the Alice Cooper rock music group, which (at least for back then) was sort of “over the top”, with electric chairs, fake blood, and a boa constrictor all part of the act. The author made the point that Alice Copper was focusing on the kids, using the principle “if the parents hate it, the kids will love it.”

So, yes, in your marketing blog, speak to both sides of an issue. Having done that, however, do all you can to speak to “your” side, and “your” target readers.

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Language That Leaves Foreigners Puzzled Can Be Perfect for Business Blogs

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“If you grow up hearing certain expressions or phrases all the time, it can be easy to overlook how weird they actually are,” Alex Palmer writes in my favorite online mag, Mental Floss. “Americanisms” are sayings we take for granted, but often don’t realize they make no sense to foreigners.

Just a few of the phrases so far removed from their original meanings, (but which we Americans understand perfectly) include:

  • “Scoot over!”
  • “Break a leg!”
  • “Not a big fan…”
  • “Break this bill for me”
  • “Don’t be such a wet blanket!”
  • “He’s a keeper!”
  • “That’s right up my alley.”
  • “Spill the beans!”

Foreigners don’t share Americans’ cultural memories and understandings. Hearing that Michael had been assigned the graveyard shift, a foreigner might think he had gotten a job at the cemetery. And, since American football is barely followed outside this country, a foreigner would have no idea what the expression “Monday morning quarterback” means.

As a blog content writer, though, I have a different take on this very “outsider puzzlement”. I think it can be turned to our advantage, letting readers feel they have “insider” status with our products and with our company or professional practice. How so? By using an allusion to something people already know, we can clarify our own message while letting those readers feel like “members of our inner circle”. Even if only some of that audience understands some “cultural allusion” we’ve made, that can help those readers bond with us.

My own broader observation, based on working with Say It For You blogging clients from many different industries and professions, is that it’s a challenge to find the precise style of communication that will best connect with target readers. Yes, you want to avoid anything that is a barrier to understanding. At the same time, in blogging for business, language that leaves foreigners puzzled can leave readers feel right at home!

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Humor is a Gift to Be Opened Carefully When Blogging for Business

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humor in blogs“Humor in business can be a remarkable gift,” Cheryl Snapp Conner writes. Skilled use of humor gets a point across, lightens the mood, and makes business owners appear more approachable, she says. Laughter is a great tool, Emily Roycraft of the ImpressionsBlog agrees, if you’re looking to build rapport with your customers. By pinpointing what is funny to your target audience, you can use humorous messages to connect with them. Stay away from controversial topics, though, Roycraft cautions, and never make a joke at a customer’s expense.

Bill Faeth, writing in the Inbound Marketing Blog, agrees with that warning. The reason comedies are typically outnumbered by dramas, he explains, is that being funny enough to make hundreds of people laugh without offending anyone is actually really tough. You can poke fun at yourself, Faeth suggests. Almost anything else, especially competitors or where they live – probably a no-no.

At the same time, I’ve come to realize over the past ten years with Say It For You, I’ve taught business owners and professional practitioners that one of the functions of a business blog is to offer different views on an issue before going on to explain why they are on one side or the other of that very issue. So long as the humor isn’t a put-down of your competitors or of those who might disagree with your take, it can serve as an icebreaker.

A number of years ago, I found material on some research done at the Saimaa University of Applied Sciences on the impact of humor in advertising. The researchers concluded that, while humor is an effective method of attracting attention to advertisements, it does not offer an advantage over non- humor at increasing persuasion.

At a National Speakers Association of Indiana meeting I attended years ago, I remember some information provided by humor speaker Jeff Fleming. One technique often used in comedy, Fleming said, is an exaggeration. Done right, he explained, exaggeration can relax the audience while emphasizing points you want them to remember. (Well…I don’t know about that, I recall thinking. Exaggeration may be OK for speakers, but we blog content writers need to be very, very careful with it, because we’re trying to build trust with readers.) The only way to adapt the technique to business blogs, I concluded, was to use an exaggerated question about the readers’ current dilemma “hooking into” readers’ concerns, then following with serious, usable information about the relief and comfort they’ll experience using your products or services.

And, while Fleming reminded speakers that the stories they tell must be “spiritually accurate” (not necessarily factually accurate), when it comes to blogging for business, it’s crucial that we content writers be factually correct about the way our company or practice can be of help.

Humor is a gift, as both Conner and Fleming point out. But it’s a gift to be opened very carefully when blogging for business!

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The Pomelo Schema for Business Blogs

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To make a profound idea compact, you’ve got to pack a lot of meaning into a little bit of messaging. Chip and Dan Heath wrote the book Made to Stick to help readers who have ideas to convey and who want to make sure their messages are understood and remembered (that they “stick”). Since, for us business blog content writers, messaging is a core mission, what the Heaths call “the pomelo schema” is a concept well worth our attention.

A schema helps create a complex message from simple material, and the authors illustrate the point by presenting two ways of explaining what a pomelo is:

Explanation #1: A pomelo is the largest citrus fruit with a thick, soft, easy-to-peel rind. The fruit has light yellow to coral pink flesh and may be juicy to slightly dry, with a taste ranging from spicy-sweet to tangy and tart.

Explanation #2: A pomelo is a supersized grapefruit with a thick, soft rind.

(The second explanation “sticks a flag” on a concept the audience already knows, making it easier for them to learn new material.)

In business blog posts, I teach at Say It For You, don’t try to give searchers information about everything you have to offer. Instead, in each post, stress just one major aspect of your company or practice. And, since you want the blog to stand out and be unusually interesting, one tactic to try is putting two things together that don’t seem to match. But, in my view, making the right unusual comparison can actually accomplish even more than teaching a complex concept using the “pomelo schema” method.

One big challenge in business blogs, newbie content writers soon learn, is sustaining the writing over long periods of time without losing reader excitement. Similes and metaphors (“pomelos”, if you will), help readers “appreciate information picturesquely”, as 19th century newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer once put it. Unlikely comparisons evoke pictures in readers’ minds:

“Put it before them briefly so they will read it, clearly so they will appreciate it, picturesquely so they will remember it and, above all, accurately so they will be guided by its light.”

“The challenge many blog writers face is that they want to write a blog that their clients will love and that also markets their company. The problem is that clients are worn out by constant advertising,” Martin Woods of semrush.com writes. If you advertise your product or service in your blog, odds are you’ll alienate your readers, he cautions. On the other hand, since the blog is part of the overall marketing plan, Woods says, it must remain relevant to the actual business. Pomelo schemas are just one tactic content writers can use to combine teaching with selling.

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Content Meant for Mature Palates

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blog content for mature palates

 

Decades ago, USA Today columnist Tammy Algood remembers, olives were always placed on the relish tray that only adults enjoyed, and no self-respecting kid ventured anywhere near the dish. Now, however, olives are a regular part of meals during the week. Algood goes on to explain that the olive is technically a fruit and, because it is remarkably bitter when it comes straight from the tree, it must be “cured”.

(WordPress.com defines “mature content” as content containing text, images and videos  contaiing nudity, offensive language and mature subject material, and marks that material Mature in its system.) Algood’s use of the term “mature” had no such connotation; her discussion of olives implied that they might appeal to the more sophisticated palates of people who have progressed beyond the basics of culinary information.

The Sophisticated Marketer’s Guide to LinkedIn describes ways to help content appeal to readers with more “mature palates”:

  • Choose a topic that is at the intersection of your knowledge and your customers’ needs.
  • Be thorough and definitive, covering all the angles and corollary topics as well.
  • Use outside experts to add credibility.

“Niche is a poor substitute for a defined audience,” writes Pratick Dholakiya in BigCommerce.com. If you’re a landscaper, he says, your target audience isn’t a bunch of landscapers, he says, but people from all walks of life: engineers, managers, marketers, and homemakers. You don’t teach people about landscaping he says, but talk about whatever it is they care about. Once you’ve defined your audience, you’re free to mix and match ideas from a wide variety of subjects and apply them to the problems your target audience cares about, Dholakiya says, helping readers see something in a new way.

To be perceived as not only a provider, but an influencer, I teach at Say It For You, you need to formulate – and clearly state – your opinions. Sophisticated consumers may already know a lot about the subject that drew them to your website, which means that content meant for those “mature palates” must offer direction, even when that direction goes against conventional thinking.

Even true olive lovers will find the fruit remarkably bitter and in need of ‘curing” in the form of guidance. Content meant for mature palates goes beyond the relish tray!

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