Unlocking Success: Search Engine Optimized Content and its Impact on Your Business

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Today’s guest post was contributed by Claire Wentz, of Caring From Afar…

As we navigate the digital age, small businesses must seize the opportunities that technology presents to remain competitive and prosper. The internet, a dynamic and ever-changing platform, provides countless avenues for small businesses to broaden their customer base, increase operational efficiency, and enhance customer satisfaction.

Integrate Seamless Online Payment Processing

In the realm of digital commerce, the ability to process payments online is a crucial aspect that small businesses cannot afford to overlook. By integrating an efficient online payment system, businesses provide customers with a secure and comfortable platform to transact. This not only improves the overall customer experience but also simplifies the payment process, thereby relieving business owners of administrative burdens and freeing up valuable time to concentrate on other vital aspects of their operation.

Harness the Power of SEO Content

In today’s digitally-focused landscape, the significance of search engine optimization (SEO) cannot be overstated. By having expert craft content that is optimized for search engines, your website’s visibility can be greatly amplified, leading to a substantial uptick in organic traffic. You can also learn many key principles via online guides and tutorials and implement strategic practices yourself. This surge in visibility has a domino effect, potentially resulting in increased sales and a thriving business. 

Keep Content in a Managed Hub

With website updates and social media marketing campaigns, staying on top of your content can quickly become a challenge. There are content management systems (CMS) you can put to work for you in organizing your material. Such a system is key in simplifying a business’ digital presence, as you can edit, schedule, and publish from one tool, rather than constantly juggling individual pieces of content. Look for an option that integrates seamlessly with your other web-focused tools. 

Prioritize Mobile-Friendly Design

Considering the prevalent use of mobile devices to access the web today, it’s essential for small businesses to prioritize a mobile-friendly website. A website with a responsive design that seamlessly adjusts to different screen sizes greatly improves the user experience, which in turn can cultivate customer loyalty and potentially boost conversion rates. Furthermore, Google also factors in mobile-friendliness when ranking websites, meaning having a mobile-optimized site can significantly improve your search engine visibility, attracting more potential customers to your business. 

Ensure Website Accessibility for All

It’s of utmost importance for small businesses to guarantee their websites are universally accessible, including catering to individuals with disabilities who may utilize assistive technologies for web navigation. An accessible website does more than just expand your potential customer pool; it aligns with legal requirements and demonstrates a dedication to inclusivity. It can enhance your brand’s reputation and credibility as a business that values all its customers, thereby fostering a more robust relationship with your audience. 

Put Optimization to Work

Embracing web-based updates can transform the trajectory of small businesses. From facilitating online payment processing and crafting search engine optimized content to ensuring mobile compatibility and website accessibility, these updates can significantly elevate your online presence. Implementing effective email marketing campaigns and leveraging social media platforms can further enhance customer engagement and drive sales. Additionally, utilizing data analytics tools can provide valuable insights into customer behavior, helping to refine strategies and improve overall business performance.

Search engine optimized content is a must-have for success in today’s business world. Putting funds, time and energy into making your content more search-friendly offers a potential return on investment that makes it worthwhile. Stay abreast of technological advancements, remain relevant, and witness your small business flourish in the digital landscape.

 

 

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Bringing Your Blog Post To a Close

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A classic work of Japanese literature, The Tale of Genji, known as the world’s first novel, centers on the life and loves of the son of an 11th century Emperor and his beloved concubine. One detail about the story has perplexed readers, interestingfacts.com explains – it ends inconclusively. For centuries, the fact historian notes, “audiences have hungered for a more decisive ending to this thousand-year-old tale”…

“Writing a conclusion for your blog article can feel a bit like a necessary evil”, Christian Rigg writes in wordtune.com. But a strong conclusion, he explains:

  • helps readers understand the importance of the article
  • encourages them to share your content
  • makes them want to come back

What makes a conclusion strong? It:

  • concisely summarizes the key points
  • explains why the information matters
  • leaves a lasting emotional impression
  • includes a call to action.

Copyblogger Henneke Duistermaat cautions writers against a common blog-writing mistake:  stale conclusions. In fact, he suggests writing your conclusion first, then filling in the rest of your blog post. Once you’ve thought through your conclusion, you can reflect focused enthusiasm in the title you select for your post.

In Chip and Dan Heath’s book The Power of Moment, they discuss research that found that when people assess an experience, they tend to forget or ignore its length, tending to rate an experience on two key factors:

  1. the best or worst moment (“the peak”)
  2. the ending

At Say it for You, we agree. In blog content writing, a great opener with a lame last line is.., well, lame. It’s important to have great titles and strong, curiosity-stirring openers, but you’ve got to have a strong ending.  If the opening line in blog content writing is the conductor’s “downbeat”, the closing line represents the final notes of the symphony – “TA-DAH!

When it comes to structuring a piece of content, comic strip creators do it best, I’m convinced. Most of the comic strips in the Indianapolis Star are perfect models, with only three “frames”. In the first, the stage is set with a situation, dilemma, question, or problem. The second box develops the idea, and the third ends with a “summary” closing line.

From the Tale of Genji to comic strips to blog marketing, by all means, blog content writers – bring things to a close!

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Don’t Know Your Tools? Know Your Gems!

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The way Jeff Bullas sees it, “Blogging is a platform for self development,” People start blogs, Bulas says, for all sorts of reasons – to educate, to have a voice, to make money. Content writing drives you to learn , to document, and to connect. It is your passion that will act as your guiding light, helping you find and connect with “your tribe”, even with no technical expertise. In terms of connecting, Bullas emphasizes, you must understand your audience’s fears, dreams, problems, and challenges, learning whom they respect in your niche.

But what about that “technical expertise” piece, including setting up the blog, choosing a domain name, selecting a host, and securing the site? Recalling the beginnings of Say It For You, now in its sixteenth year of content writing, I’m reminded of a favorite saying of an attorney friend of mine: “Don’t know your tools? Know your gems.” In other words, the advice I’d offer new content writers is this: Call on advisers who can help with the technology piece while you focus on the messaging.

Meanwhile, needless to say, the technology piece isn’t standing still, but changing and developing at an astounding pace. Still, as Emily Nix of Nectafy observes, “excellent content requires a human touch”.”Tools are nice,” Danny Sullivan of Third Door Media remarks in a Start Your Own Business magazine piece, alluding to all the buzz about artificial intelligence. “but we’ve had tools for years to build houses, yet we haven’t completely automated house building.”.”Despite the fact that ChatGPT can develop conversational AI tools, it cannot take the place of human content creators”, the Med Responsive digital marketing agency believes.

As content writers, our primary function must be learning all we can, not about the “tools” and mechanics of the internet, but about our target audience (or, in the case of Say It For You content writers, the target audience for each of our clients)..When it comes to the technical aspects of delivering that content, we’ve turned to technology maven “gems” for ongoing advice and guidance, while our writers focus on the message.

“Don’t know your tools? Know your gems,” is the byword.

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Making Your Blog Bed Every Day

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In an interview with AARP Magazine, William McRaven (the Navy Seal admiral who oversaw the Osama Bin Laden raid) talks about the wisdom of doing small things right. “When I was training to become a SEAL, we got inspected every morning. The instructor would invariably pull out a quarter and flip it into the air to see if you’d pulled the blanket and sheet taut enough to make the coin bounce.” The chief petty officer had explained why. “If you can’t even make your bed to exacting standards, how are we ever going to trust you to lead a complex SEAL mission? Learn to do the little things right and you’ll learn to do the big things right.”

Nice to know I’m not the only one who thinks paying attention to detail is important , in my case, referring to the process of creating  marketing content for blogs.

Yes, blogs are supposed to be less formal and more personal in tone than traditional websites. But whenever content is posted in the name of your business (or in the case of Say It For You writers, in the name of a client’s business), the business brand is being “put out there” for all to see.

Formatting of blog content is very, very important, including the appropriate use of:

  • bolding and italics
  • short, concise sentences and paragraphs
  • bullet points and numbered lists
  • white space

Just as an unmade or poorly made bed is a sign of lack of standards and attention to detail, blog content writing “wardrobe malfunctions” convey the kind of message you do not want going to readers. Be fastidious about grammar and spelling errors, avoiding run-on sentences and redundancy. Tighten up those paragraphs, giving them “hospital corner” impact.

True, most readers will merely scan your content and won’t pay very close attention to details like those. Some might, though. Can you afford to have potential customers noticing your lack of care in making your “blog bed”?

 

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Take a Few of the 100+ Writer Prompts and Call Me in the Morning

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Writer’s block is like being stuck at a truck stop parking lot, unable to start your car, the editors of The Writer magazine understand. For online content marketers, writer’s block may put its victimes in een greater pain, given that frequency is so crucia to the success of online marketing through blogs. At Say It For You, .after years of being involved in all aspects of blog writing and training, one irony I”ve found is that business owners who “show up” with recently published content on their websites are rare.  there’s a tremendous fall-off rate, with most blogs abandoned months or even weeks after they’re begun. Pity, because in all advertising and marketing, as Mark Zimmer of Zimmer Marketing explains,  the more often a customer is exposed to a message, the more of a sense of “omnipresence” there is.

The fear of “saying old things” is one many business owners and professional practitioners have when it comes to their blog. Even if they understand the overall marketing value of having a blog, their concern is that, sooner or later, they (or their blog content writer) will run out of things to say. In blogging training sessions, I need to explain that it’s more than OK – in fact it’s a good idea – to repeat themes already covered in former posts. The trick is to adding a layer of new information or a new insight each time.

For the benefit of my Say It For You readers, I’m using this post to highlight just four of the Writer prompts that seem most applicable to blog content writing:

“Take something you have recently learned – a fact, a skill – and give it one of your characters in a significant way.”
One point I’ve consistently stressed in these blog content writing tutorials is how important it is to provide valuable information to readers, while avoiding any hint of “hard sell”.  It’s helpful to collate helpful hints from a variety of experts, offering those as a “gift” from the business owner to blog visitors. Even more impactful, though, is sharing valuable lessons learned by the professional practitioner or business owners based on their own hard-won experience and expertise.

“Use a line from poetry to inspire new work”
When it comes to blogging for business, reading poetry teaches content writers clarity and precision. T. S. Eliot’s “April is the cruellest month” can inspire a piece about preparing one’s hoe for spring, about college application essays submission, or about tax planning..

“Create an unconventional graveyard scene with a surprising outcome.”
While a funeral company’s “green burial” practices might be the subject for its content marketing, an estate planning attorney might use an anecdote to stimulate thoughts about estate planning,

Write the sequel to your favorite fairy tale. Does money really buy happiness for Jack and his beanstalk? Do Snow White and the prince end up getting a divorce?
Online readers likely to find your blog through organic search will be those who already have a need for what you have to sell and for what you do. On the other hand, at Say It For You, we’re convinced blogging for business is the perfect tool for introducing those readers to newer applications and uses for your products and services One important function of a blog is to “point picture’ of the consequences of inaction.

With a main key to business blogging success being simply staying on task, you may find writer prompts may be just the ticket!

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