For Humor and Allusions in Blogs, Make Sure Readers Don’t “Huh?”

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“Know your audience. Not everyone will think every joke is funny,” advises Michael Strecker in the book Young Comic’s Guide to Telling Jokes. Strecker’s advice applies to blog content writing, as we’ve learned through experience at Say it For You.

One reason certain jokes fall flat with certain audiences, I’m convinced, is not that those jokes are offensive or unfunny. It’s that many jokes are based on a cultural allusion that is simply not familiar to that audience.

A cultural allusion is an indirect reference to a person, place, or idea that is not directly described. Here are a few of Strecker’s jokes that will be funny to you only if you happen to recognize the allusion to history, literature, mathematics, geology, or the Bible…….

  • What was the sea creatures’ strike called? Octopi Wall Street.
    (The allusion is to the protest movement against economic inequality that started in New York City and which was named Occupy Wall Street.)
  • Who invented the ball point pen? The Incas.
    (The allusion is to the ancient Incan empire in the country of Peru.)
  • Why was the precious metal so silly? It was fool’s gold.
    (The allusion is to the metal pyrite, which has no value, but which resembles gold in its appearance. Many treasure-seekers foolishly mistook pyrite for gold.)
  • How did the dentist pay for his vision exam? An eye for a tooth.
    (The allusion is to a passage from the Bible about punishing a man who injures another – “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth…)
  • What do you do at a math party? East pi and square dance.
    (The allusion is to pi, which is the ration of a circle’s circumference to its diameter, approximately 3.14.)
  • What do you call a street where Shakespeare, Edgar Allen Poe, and James Patterson live? Writer’s Block.
    (The allusion is to three famous writers and to a psychological “block” in which a person represses painful thoughts of memories.)

In blog marketing, we might choose to use an allusion to get a point across without going into a lengthy explanation. Or, we might want to get readers thinking about our subject in a new way. We might even use allusions to cement a bond between our client and the blog readers, showing the business owner or practitioner has experienced some of the same problems and obstacles as their customers now face.

There’s only one problem – an allusion does not describe in detail the person or thing to which it’s referring – readers have to recognize the allusion. As content writers, we need to gauge our readers’ areas of interest and even their level of education. If they simply don’t know the underlying story, literary tale or other reference point, we could be leaving them scratching their heads, and asking “Huh?”

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Slogans and Blogs – Sisters Under the Skin?

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While logos are visual representations of a brand, slogans are audible representations, Lindsay Kolowich Cox explains in a Hubspot piece. The idea, in both cases, is grab consumers’ attention and leave a key message in consumers’ minds. Earlier this week in this Say It For You blog, I highlighted the 1-800-Got-Junk slogan as an example of emphasizing convenience and ease-of-use.

Several of the ingredients which Kolowich-Cox thinks make for great slogans can contribute to the success of blog posts:

A great slogan includes a key benefit. The emphasis needs to be on key benefits of the product or service, not its features. Proctor & Gamble’s Bounty paper towels are “the quicker picker upper.”
Focus a blog post on painting either a “more” (glamour, time saved, comfort, money, miles per gallon) or “less” (pain, cost, waste, hassle) picture.

A great slogan differentiates the brand. How can one piece of chocolate truly stand out from another? M&M’s “Melts in your mouth, not in your hands” differentiates with an implied comparison with every other chocolate brand.
It’s almost axiomatic that, in writing for business, we want to clarify the ways we are better than the competition. But, rather than saying negative things about other companies or practitioners, explain the reasons you have chosen to do things the way you do.

A great slogan imparts positive feelings, possibly through nostalgia. MasterCard’s “There are some things money can’t buy. For everything else, there’s MasterCard.”
True stories about the mistakes and struggles that ultimately led to your success are very humanizing, adding to the trust readers place in the people behind a business or practice. 

A great slogan reflects the values held by the organization.
Whether business owners or professional practitioners are doing their own blog posting or hiring professional content writers to help, the blog is conveying the values and beliefs of the owners.  In fact, the content is an invitation to readers to become part of the process of bringing those values to life.

A great slogan conveys consistency. Kolowich-Cox cites Verizon’s “Can you hear me now? Good.” (Competitors may have better texting options or fancier phones, the implication is, but with Verizon you can always rely on service.
Consistency is the very backbone of business blogging success. high-quality stuff.  To satisfy a search engine, your blog material must be updated frequently. Most important, consistent posting of content shows readers that you are “present” and involved.

Blog posts, of course, are much longer than slogans. Still, the idea in both cases is to grab consumers’ attention and leave a key message in their minds, built around an unmet consumer need.

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The First Blog Post Shows the Palette

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There’s an exercise artists can do to break through their equivalent of “writer’s block,” my friend Phil read in an urban sketching book about using watercolor. Deciding what to put on the first page of your sketchbook is the hardest, the author understood. A new artist might experience inhibitions about opening the paint wrappers. But if the first page is used to give the artist a better idea of what the colors will look like on paper, the rest will follow naturally.

Beginnings are hard in any field. The first day of class, for example, gets a lot of attention from pedagogues, because what happens on that day shows students what to expect from your instruction, Alicia Alexander and Elizabeth Natalle explain in a text on interpersonal communication.

A second friend, book writing coach Myra Levine, says that each author’s first question should be “whose eyes do we see through?” Point of View, Levine says, determines every word you write. In Levine’s webinar offers writing “prompts” to help writers envision the “palette”.

Business owners and professional practitioners launching their blog often experience the same feel of “opening the paint wrappers” or putting the first words to web page. At Say It For You, we explain that the opening post will set the tone for the ongoing blog series, letting readers know:

  • They’ve come to the right place – this blog promises to be a good source for the type of information I want and need?
  • They can tell the author/company/practice is likeable, resonating with their own belief system.
  • They understand there’s a reason you’ve decided to use a blog as an ongoing communication tool.

Fear of flying is an anxiety disorder, and some of the elements of that fear have nothing to do with the actually risks associated with flight. In Fear of Blogging, David Meerman Scott says many business owners fear:

  • looking silly
  • not having important things to say
  • lack of computer savvy
  • blogging “won’t work” for their industry

Of course, from a business standpoint, fear of blogging can be a fearsome business mistake, since, in the time it’s taken you to read this far into my blog post, thousands and thousands of new blog posts have been introduced, some by your competitors!

So, go ahead – open up that new sketchbook. Peel the plastic off the paint tubes. Try writing the answer to this question:

If you had only 10 words to describe just how you ended up in – and why you’re
still in- your present industry or profession, what would those words be?

There’s your business blog “palette”!

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Sharing Wisdom from the Greats in Blogging for Business

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How did Chrysler, which not too long before had needed government-backed loans in order to survive, transform itself into a partner coveted by Daimler (the gold standard of European car makers), becoming the most profitable car company in the world? In his book Guts, Robert A. Lutz, Chrysler’s product-development genius answers these questions and many, many more.

For us blog content writers, there are several valuable lessons to be gleaned from this book by a business “great”:

The power of being personal:
Lutz lists his own credentials in the following order: parent, citizen, taxpayer, employer, alumnus. Guts is about Lutz himself as much as it is about his company, and that’s precisely what lends power to the narrative.

One interesting perspective on the work we do as professional bloggers is that we are interpreters, translating clients’ corporate message into human, people-to-people terms.  That’s the reason I prefer first and second person writing in business blog posts over third person “reporting”. I think people tend to buy when they see themselves in the picture, but even more so, when they relate emotionally to the people bringing them the message.

  • The power of recounting past struggles
    The very name of Lutz’s book, Guts, speaks to past struggles, to hardships overcome. At Say It For You, I recommend including some How-I-Did-It posts in the blog marketing plan. There are several reasons that sharing secrets and failures helps readers relate to a business or practice:

    True stories about mistakes and struggles are very humanizing, adding to the trust readers place in the people behind the business or practice.

  • Stories of struggles and failures can be used as a means to an end, using the special expertise and insights you’ve gained towards solving readers’ problems.
  • Blogs also have a damage control function.  When customer complaints and concerns are recognized and dealt with publicly (there’s nothing more public than the Internet!), that gives the “apology” – and the remediation – a lot more weight in the eyes of readers.

    Does it help to share wisdom from leaders in your own industry or profession in your blog?
    When you link to someone else’s accomplishments or remarks on a subject you’re covering, that can have two important positive effects: reinforcing a point you want to make and showing you’re in touch with trends in your own field. Obviously, as with all tools and tactics, “re-gifting” content needs to be handled with restraint.

To me, though, the biggest advantage of sharing others’ wisdom in your own content, is that you’re showing that you’re excited by the insights you’ve gained, and you want your readers to benefit as well.

Sharing wisdom? Go ahead, I say. We can never have too much inspiration.

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Add the Fred Factor to Your Business Blog

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Within ten minutes of his house are two giant hardware stores that are known for their low prices , Mark Sanborn relates in his book The Fred Factor, but he never goes to either one. Instead, Sanborn goes to a smaller store about ten minutes away. There, when you walk in the door, knowledgeable helpful staff members greet you and take you to the exact spot where you can find what you need. And, Sanborn adds, they ask enough questions to find out if what you asked for is what you need for the job. All organizations have access to the same information, training, compensation systems, and processes. So why do some succeed and others flop, Sanborn asks? The secret is passionate employees.

How can that “Fred Factor” be made to come across a computer screen, I wondered. With so many potential customers meeting you online these days, rather than in person, how can you replicate the feeling of being greeted by “knowledgeable and helpful staff members”? First-time blog site visitors can, indeed, become customers IF, Neil Patel explains, “you listen to them and give them a good visitor experience.” The goal – moving visitors upwards through the “trust pyramid”, from awareness to understanding, then belief, and finally to action.

The process begins, Patel says, with defining your ideal reader. See that customer as one person, not as groups of people, then develop a unique selling proposition around that very person. Just a Sanborn was saying about his favorite hardware store, success is all about solving problems and making customers happy. What valuable gift can you give to your first-time blog visitors in order to excite and retain them. Put yourself in their shoes and feel their pain, Patel says.

Sanborn was impressed with the fact that the hardware associates were right there at the door to welcome him and help him navigate to precisely the right shelf to find what he needed. In precisely the same way, now that visitors have found their way to your blog, your immediate challenge is to put them at ease by assuring them they’ve come to the right place and convey that they are valued.

Translating a face-to-face shopping experience into a digital visit is the challenge we blog content writers take on. Saying you offer superior customer service is never enough – you have to specifically illustrate ways in which your company’s customer service exceeds the norm. 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”.

You might not think of simplifying your website navigation as another way to personalize your service, but it absolutely is. 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. Just as the hardware salesperson asked questions before taking Sanborn to the right section of the store, the website can help “steer” visitors to the right click.

Think of ways to add a “Fred Factor” to your website and blog.

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